


Time for Mourning

by ziusura



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Jydia, M/M, Post Season 2, Scallison, Slow Burn, alpha pack conflict, mild animal gore, undead!Stiles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-09-05
Updated: 2013-05-28
Packaged: 2017-11-13 15:24:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 49,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/504946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ziusura/pseuds/ziusura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fill for <a href="http://teenwolfkink.livejournal.com/6131.html?thread=4340723#t4340723">prompt</a> at the kink meme. </p>
<p>  <i>Stiles dies, and nobody knows the truth about what happened. Not even Stiles, who is mostly confused about why he woke up in a body bag and why he doesn't have a pulse anymore. </i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  Original prompt:  
>   
>  _Stiles dies, and nobody knows the truth about what happened. Not even Stiles, who is mostly confused about why he woke up in a body bag and why he doesn't have a pulse anymore._  
>   
>  _They don't know what Stiles is now, but his normal life is officially finished, so he winds up staying with Derek._  
>   
>  Takes place after season 2 so it has a canon setting and canon past events, but I set it as AU because I really don't think Stiles is going to die in or before season 3.  
> If you want to know whether or not it has a happy ending, the answer's [here](http://ziusura.tumblr.com/private/51610324685/tumblr_mnjfqoe22y1r3cuqh).  
> 

Stiles didn’t so much wake-up as have a giant “come to” brick slammed into his face. It felt a little like he was watching the Millennium Falcon travel in hyperspace. It was dark because the ship was in outer space, then the hyperspace started and the ship blasted through the galaxy with little lines and bursts of color trailing through his vision from passing the stars and planets at an incredible speed, and then it slowed down to a stop and there was blackness again. It left him disoriented and confused, and he kept blinking to try and determine if his eyes were actually open or closed. 

Of course it was probably only so black because he was in a body bag. 

The zipper was pressed against his nose and it took an extraordinary amount of wiggling to get his arms out of their cinched-to-his-sides position. Stiles debated calling for help, but he had absolutely no freaking clue where he was, or why he was in a body bag. He wasn’t sure if he would endanger the pack or what. 

Eventually, he managed to get the bag open enough to shove his head and shoulders through and the rest of his body just followed suit, like the body bag was birthing its own little Stiles baby. Of course, if he had any sort of muscle control he wouldn’t have finished the bag’s birthing process pressed against the floor next to the table where he had been laying on when he came to, but Stiles was far too clumsy for that. The bruises he’d inevitably get from falling onto the floor would heal eventually. 

His legs were stiff and shaky when Stiles pulled himself up against the table, as if he had run several miles and done nothing but lacrosse drills for two hours straight, but he couldn’t feel the pain. 

“Okay, okay, mental checklist time,” he said. He startled for a moment, sure that someone else was in the bare, lightly lit room with him because his voice did not sound like that. But he was alone and it was definitely his voice, no matter how hoarse and crackly it was. 

Number one, he was in a body bag in what appeared to be the morgue of Beacon Hills Hospital. Why that was, he had no idea. Two. He was alone in a body bag in the morgue and he had no freaking idea where Scott or Derek or any of Derek’s pack were. Three. He had absolutely no freaking idea how he got there. None. 

Last thing he remembered was brushing his teeth before bed and spilling some toothpaste on his dad’s spare uniform pants because they were next to the sink because there had been an unfortunate spaghetti accident and the pants had been caught in the cross fire. Which, whatever Scott said, was absolutely _not_ Stiles’ fault. Not at all. 

Before that Stiles had been sneaking into his house through his window, after a boost from Scott. His dad was home and Stiles was already grounded for something that was totally not his fault. The spaghetti incident was _not_ his fault. 

And before that? Before that Stiles couldn’t remember anything. He remembered getting home from school, sure. Didn’t remember the school part much but that was understandable. It was a _Tuesday_ and nobody remembered _Tuesdays_. But after parking his jeep and making some cheese toast to get a little fuel before his scheduled hour or five of WoW, nothing. Nada. Zilch. 

“Great,” he mumbled into his arm and winced at the sound. His voice was not getting any better. 

“Oh God, I sound like a smoker. My dad is going to search every inch of my room and jeep looking for my smokes that definitely do not exist. Jesus, I’ll never be able to leave my room again.” 

Stiles licked his lips, wincing at how dry his mouth was, and nervously rubbed his hands on his thighs. Which were bare. 

What?

He glanced down, panicking, and sure enough he was hanging loose and free for the entire world to see. No clothes meant no pants which meant no pockets which meant no phone. Well, it looked like calling Scott or Derek’s pack was out of the question. 

Stiles groaned into his elbow. Walking naked outside in the middle of November was not his idea of fun. 

Surprisingly, it wasn’t that cold outside. Sure, it was dark and windy, but Stiles’ skin didn’t break out in goosebumps and his teeth weren’t chattering at all. It was weird, but convenient. There had to be a warm night in November at least once, Stiles guessed. 

Before he snuck out of the hospital he didn’t manage to find his clothes or cell, but he did stumble across a shelf of hospital gowns (which Stiles _seriously_ hoped were clean) and promptly put two on to keep his butt from hanging out the back. 

Mostly he was just thankful that it was the asscrack of night, even if it was supposed to be freezing, because that meant the chances of someone seeing him stumbling around in a hospital gown (or God, _naked_ ) were much, much slimmer. Beacon Hills was one of those towns that shut down at night, no matter how much it tried to be a big city. 

Initially he headed out towards Scott’s house because if anyone would know what had happened to him, it was bound to be Scott. Or, at least Stiles hoped that was the case because if Scott was too busy listening to Allison’s heartbeat across the freaking town to notice when Stiles’ sped up or whatever when he was in danger, Stiles was going to have to revoke the best friend card. Besides, Scott was the last person Stiles remembered being in direct contact with. Sure, he yelled downstairs to his dad when he asked when school got out for the year, but his dad wasn’t in the know about supernatural creatures. And well, Stiles had looked a little too much like he’d been wandering around outside at that point. 

He changed his plans when he started nearing the residential area and realized just how unclothed he was. Stiles could see lights on and hear people conversing on sidewalks, and, well, Stiles may have wanted information but he was not inclined to let the little social standing he had at Beacon Hills suffer. Apparently it was not quite as late at night as Stiles had thought. Scott was probably at Allison’s anyway. If there were people outside it was still early enough to sneak in her room and give her goodnight kisses, according to Scott. 

There were other places he could go, anyway. His house wasn’t so much an option for the same reasons Scott’s wasn’t, plus he would get absolutely no information on his whereabouts that night if he was there alone and Stiles would very much like to know why he was in a body bag that night. 

So that left Derek’s house. Which was ten minutes from where he was standing in a car. 

Great. Tall dark and lurky was his only choice and he had to waste an indeterminate amount of _forever_ to get to his freaking house. 

The woods were just as creepy as ever and the burnt shell of the Hale House just as silent and alone as it was the last time Stiles was there. Surprisingly, Derek didn’t burst out of the front door when Stiles came within ten feet of the house. Still didn’t when Stiles started climbing the steps. It was weird and it made Stiles feel like he was trespassing because he hadn’t been acknowledged. Of course, he’d probably only actually had permission to be on Hale property once, and he’d been on it _way_ more than once. But that didn’t ease his mind any. It just felt different, extra quiet, like it was drowning out the sounds of his heartbeat and exhale with it’s own silence. Taking away his life. 

Derek still hadn’t come to the door by the time he reached it, and Stiles swallowed once, then twice, and stared at the hard lines of the Alpha Pack graffiti on the wood. Stiles hadn’t come anywhere close to what Peter and Derek knew with his research on it, but that didn’t stop him from bluffing. Stiles wasn’t _his_ pack. Not that he felt much like Scott’s nowadays anyway with him being human and all. 

The door creaked when he opened it and Stiles found himself wincing at the noise. If Derek hadn’t realized he was there by then, he certainly did now.  
Only he didn’t. 

There was no movement, no reaction at all. But unless he’d gone for some sort of werewolf joy run, Derek was definitely there. Stiles couldn’t see him leaving his Camaro at the house for all to see if he wasn’t somewhere nearby. 

Stiles approached the stairs, nervously looking around for signs of life. Isaac and Peter probably weren’t there, he figured, since he’d probably hear talking or fighting or whatever Derek and his pack did on Tuesday nights. _If_ it was even still Tuesday, because honestly Stiles had no idea. 

Derek was crouched down next to an old couch in a room upstairs. He was in the process of moving his arm to pick something up off the ground when Stiles peered around the doorframe, and he was afraid he’d maybe caught Derek jerking off or something and _that_ would be a weird thing to walk in on. But he wasn’t, and Stiles didn’t know why Derek hadn’t noticed him yet. 

“Derek?” he mumbled, fidgeting in the doorway. He glanced down at his feet and _holy God_ he was still wearing the hospital gown, not that he had the chance to change into something different, but it was the idea of it. Having Derek see him in it did nothing for his self-esteem, but on the bright side he wasn’t naked and Derek wasn’t Lydia. 

Derek froze and peered around his shoulder at Stiles. His expression turned surprised for a moment before his face steeled itself into something more serious, but he was still looking far paler than Stiles had ever seen him. 

“Oh man, did I scare you?” Stiles tried and failed to keep the grin from forming on his face. “One point for the human for totally besting the werewolf senses. That is so totally payback for all the times you’ve…” 

Stiles trailed off in confusion. Derek’s expression hadn’t changed and he hadn’t moved at all since he turned to see Stiles. It unnerved Stiles, seeing Derek that shook up. 

“What?” Stiles mumbled, biting his lip. 

Derek swallowed and stood up slowly, as if Stiles was a small animal that would dart the second someone moved too fast or made too loud of a noise. Stiles’ eyes tracked the movement of Derek’s arm again, the limb slipping whatever was in his hand into his pocket. 

“Stiles?” he asked, his voice coming out strangled. 

“Yeah?” Stiles was really freaking confused. 

“Stiles?”

“ _Yeah?_ Are we going to keep playing this game or what? Yes, I’m Stiles.” 

Derek shook his head and walked closer, steps unconfident. “No, I, um. Stiles? Are you—No. No, you’re not. Impossible.”

His face shifted to something that was more recognizable—anger—and slammed Stiles into the doorframe by his neck. His hand was warm against Stiles throat, a little _too_ warm, actually. The heat was practically searing his flesh and even the cool slickness of Derek’s claws against his skin did nothing to appease it. 

“Who are you and why do you have his body,” he snarled. It wasn’t a question, but a demand, and Stiles didn’t know what he was supposed to say.

Derek hadn’t shifted from what Stiles could see, even though his claws were out on the hand against his throat, but his eyes were a startling red. Stiles had only seen them a handful of times and every time he knew to fear them. 

“Answer me!” he shouted, and Stiles heard the claws dig into the wood behind his neck, threatening. 

“God. I-I don’t know what you’re asking, Derek. I’m Stiles. _Stiles_. Y’know? Scott’s bee-eff-eff forever? Please don’t kill me because I’m pretty sure Scott wouldn’t like that. Y’know Scott, my _werewolf_ best friend that could kick your butt if you’re having a bit of a bad day.” Stiles was babbling, frantic and honestly frightened because he hadn’t had Derek’s anger directed at him like this. Never like this. 

“You’re lying.”

“No I’m _not_. I am honest to God, Stiles. Why can’t I be Stiles, Derek? Because you’re really freaking me out.”

Derek ground his teeth together, tightening his grip around Stiles’ throat.

“Because Stiles is dead.”

Stiles stilled underneath Derek’s hand, shrinking into the frame behind him. 

“What?” he forced out in that same freaking hoarse not-voice he had. Derek’s hand loosened a little and Stiles thought he felt his claws retract. 

The stillness didn’t last long. Stiles shook, started pushing against Derek, who’s face had turned back into that pale, frightened little stare, and Stiles didn’t know what was going on. 

“No. Nonononononono. I don’t know what you’re talking about. Derek. Derek, I’m not dead. I’m right here! Stiles. Alive. Flesh and blood because I’m _alive_.”

He ignored that he “woke up” in a body bag. Ignored that he was naked inside the body bag in a _freaking_ morgue. Like he was almost ready to be set in the freezer and autopsied. 

“So I woke up in a body bag? That’s nothing, right? Derek? Because you guys needed me to do it. For research right? For a mission? I don’t know why but you needed a human in a body bag and this has got to be one big trick because, Derek, _I’m not dead_.” 

His chest felt so tight. His own body was constricting him, choking him. 

Derek had a look in his eye that Stiles didn’t know how to interpret. He couldn’t interpret it, because there was no way in _hell_ that Derek was looking at him with pity. 

His palm slid from Stiles’ throat onto his shoulder, pushing him no less harder against the door frame. “Stiles,” he mumbled as if he was afraid of the words. 

“Derek, I don’t know what’s going on because I _can’t_ be dead. I’m not dead. I didn’t get to go on a date with Lydia, I never saw the otherside of the states, I never—“

“Stiles.”

“—beat Scott on that stupid level in Mario Cart, and I—“

“Stiles!”

“—I never kissed a girl or anything, Derek. I’m a freaking _virgin_. I’m not dead because I _can’t_ be.”

“But Stiles, you are dead.” 

Stiles stilled. He knew that. He was dead. Stiles wanted to punch something, anything, and scream. He wanted to laugh and cry and _hurt_ someone. He was dead and he never thought he would ever mourn himself. 

“I know,” he said and the words hung heavy in the air, thick and just as intangible as his leftover dreams. “Please get off me.”

Derek grunted and pushed off of Stiles’ shoulder to lean on the wall just inside of the room, arms crossed over his chest. He still didn’t trust that Stiles was Stiles; his claws were visible on one of his hands and he held them out to threaten Stiles, or whatever he thought was possessing Stiles. But nothing was possessing Stiles but his own grief.

Stiles fell to the floor immediately, his legs strong enough to hold him up but his will too weak. He was still wearing the freaking hospital gown and had no doubt Derek could see up it if he wanted to, but he didn’t care. It was just dead people junk anyway because Stiles was _dead_. 

“Why…” he started, but he couldn’t finish it. _Why am I dead?_

“We don’t know.” Derek swallowed and shifted feet. “You weren’t at school today and Scott went to find out why. Found you dead in your bed.” Derek paused, his head quirking to the side like a dog’s when it heard someone shuffling in the kitchen. He continued as if he never stopped. “Immediately called an ambulance even though he already knew you were gone. Your dad got there before the ambulance did.” 

Fuck. His _dad_. Stiles brought his hands to his head and rubbed furiously at the peach fuzz there. He wanted to cry but his body wouldn’t let him. Screw dignity. Dignity didn’t matter when you were dead. 

Stiles opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted by the sound of someone climbing the stairs. It was Isaac, and Stiles shifted his legs so his hospital gown didn’t show off the downstairs business because Isaac went to his school and talked to people he knew, and somehow that was more frightening than Derek seeing. Probably because Derek was a broody loner. He only had the house to tell. 

“Derek!” He shouted and Derek shifted so Isaac could see him in the room. “It’s Stiles. His body is gone.” 

Derek huffs and points down at Stiles on the floor. “I know.” 

Peter strolled in after Isaac and took one look at Stiles before raising an eyebrow at Derek. “Well isn’t _this_ a predicament.” 

They moved downstairs to a livingroom area with enough seating for all four of them. The roof was less likely to fall on top of them down there, apparently, and it took everything in Stiles’ power not to mention that if the roof fell on the second floor, it was probably going to bring the floor on top of them down anyway. Since Stiles was dead anyway his opinion didn’t make much of a difference. 

Isaac sat Stiles down onto a floral print couch, charred and black from all the ash in the house or the fire itself, Stiles didn’t know, and Derek handed him a water bottle. He made no move to open it, the idea of drinking anything didn’t really appeal to him, but holding it kept his hands from shaking. If he focused on running his nails in the indents of the bottle he couldn’t think of anything else, like how he was dead. 

Peter sat in a newer looking chair across from the couch and motioned for Derek to sit in the other remaining chair, but Derek only raised and eyebrow and leaned against the wall behind him. Isaac ignored the entire exchange, making himself comfortable on the cushion next to Stiles. 

“So, Stiles,” Peter began, the picture of a psychologist with his chin resting on his clasped hands and an expression that made him look like he could listen to someone for hours. “What do you remember?” 

Derek grunted and directed a glare at the back of Peter’s head. Peter rolled his eyes and sat back in his chair without looking at Derek. “Oh, right. Take control dear _Alpha_.”

Derek didn’t say anything but gave Stiles the motion to go-on. 

Stiles sighed and squeezed the water bottle. He could feel the water pressure change through the plastic. “Not much. Just coming home, eating, playing WoW. After that there’s nothing for a while. Then I remember Scott helping me sneak back into my house and I got ready for bed. “ 

Derek pinched the point where his nose met his eyebrows and sighed. “Well, that was certainly helpful insight. It’s not like you do those things everyday.” 

Stiles almost threw the water bottle at him. “I’m sorry that that isn’t good enough for you, _Alpha_. Maybe you should bash my head into a doorframe again. It’ll probably slosh my _dead brain_ around in my head enough that jogs my memory.” 

Derek shot a glare at him. That wasn’t going make him remember anything either, no matter how much closer Derek got to the laser setting on his glare. 

“Okay. Fine. Let’s get some sleep and continue this in the morning. Maybe a good night’s rest will jog your memory.”

Derek’s word was final and he made his way upstairs, presumably to go to bed. Peter left the house saying something about going back to the hotel, and Stiles had to appreciate his living standards because he was _dead_ and he thought the Hale House was an utter dump. A dump that apparently Isaac and Derek insisted on living in. 

Isaac left the livingroom area for a second or two and returned with two quilts, one of which he dropped on top of Stiles. Stiles clutched it but didn’t move to lie down on the couch he was sitting on. Isaac opened the remaining quilt and curled up in the chair Peter was sitting on earlier. 

No beds, hunh. 

“Do you guys seriously sleep on the charred remains of the furniture that survived the fire? Because that’s sort of creepy. I could be sitting on dead people skin and hair melted into the fabric.” 

Isaac sighed and gestured roughly at the chair he was laying in. “We got this last month.”

“Oh how delightful, you really do. I’m not really sure what I was thinking you guys slept on though. I don’t even know if I thought you guys actually _lived_ here.” 

“Stiles, go the fuck to sleep.” 

Stiles opened his mouth to retort, thinking about asking him if he kissed his mother with that mouth, or quoting a line from Go the Fuck to Sleep, but he thought better of it. With a heavy sigh, or what would’ve been a sigh if he actually breathed, he collapsed onto the couch and pulled the quilt onto himself. 

He wasn’t tired, the opposite of it in fact, and the silence made his heart hurt. Isaac’s slowing breaths and sleepy muttering only served to remind him that he couldn’t have that anymore. Stiles couldn’t even make himself breathe. Thinking about filling his chest, taking in a breath, did nothing. His blood wasn’t flowing and it wasn’t acidic enough for his dead brain to tell his body to breathe. 

But hey, he got his eleven-year-old self’s birthday wish when he wanted to be able to breathe underwater without gills. 

Hours passed and Stiles never got tired. He stared at the ceiling instead, watching the shadows change shapes as the light changed.  


* * *

Waking up was weird when one was dead, Stiles decided. It more or less felt like time was speeding up, turning hours into seconds and months into minutes until everything was lucid and clear. It was getting an awareness for the surroundings after spending what felt like years staring at the same line on the ceiling. 

Isaac stirred in the chair, nose wrinkling when light poured across his face from the nearby (broken) window, and Stiles recognized that it was morning. He could hear Derek shuffling around upstairs and he became aware of Peter sitting in a chair next to Isaac, sipping coffee and focused on reading something on his laptop. 

Stiles sat up and Peter set his coffee down on the floor next to the chair. “Oh, good. I was beginning to believe you had died again on our couch.” 

“No, uh, not officially I guess.”

“I suppose not.” Peter smirked at him and returned to his laptop. “Did you know that you’re the second case this year of a dead body being robbed from the morgue? Now obviously we know nothing came of the first since Jackson was really alive, but you aren’t. I wonder how they’ll react when they see you, an animated corpse.” 

“I, uh, I don’t really want to think about it.” And he didn’t. He didn’t want to know what his dad’s face looked like when he found out Stiles was dead, or hell, Scott or Allison or any other of his friends’ faces. To see their expression change to happiness when they saw him walking around, only to laugh and say, “Nope, I’m actually _still_ dead”? He didn’t want to watch his death twice. 

It was quiet in the room again. Derek had yet to come downstairs, Isaac turned so the light hit his curls instead of his eyes, and Peter clicked absentmindedly on his computer. Stiles didn’t like the quiet; it made him think too much. 

“So, um, about your earlier statement?” he asked, trying to fill the room with some sort of noise, even if the source was dead. 

Peter paused from his reading and looked up at him. “Yes?”

“You thought I died again. Why?”

Peter smiled and reached down to take another sip of his coffee. “You obviously have no signs of life—no heartbeat, no breathing, no bowels gurgling and the likes, and you don’t smell like anything. You’re virtually nothing and the only reason we can tell that you’re—forgive the expression—alive is your movement and voice.”

“Oh.” Stiles didn’t have anything to say to that. He was nothing. Nothing but a talking, walking doll. 

“Did you know that small male cuttlefish often disguise themselves into females to ensure that their genes will pass onto the next generation? The large males fight over prime egg laying spots on the reefs to get the most itty-bitty females to come mate with them and lay their eggs. But small males sneak in pretending to be females and flirt with the actual ladies in the larger male’s spot, passing along their genes too. You may seem dead and harmless, but I don’t trust you. Derek says he can smell Stiles on you, but I just don’t sense it. We’re guarding the prime spot on the reef right now and we don’t want to be taken by surprise when it turns out that the eggs we’re protecting aren’t ours at all.” Peter finished with a grin, a warning.

“I’m not a girl and I’m not pretending to be one,” Stiles mumbled, reaching underneath the couch to try and find the water bottle from the night before. 

Peter raised an eyebrow. “ _That’s_ what you got out of my warning?”

Stiles kept himself from jumping up in triumph when his fingers brushed the edge of the bottle and pulled it into his hands. “Yeah, well, I’m a teenaged boy with hormones everywhere and the attention span of a goldfish. Telling me exactly what you mean right at the start is the best thing to do.” 

He knew what Peter was getting at, he wasn’t stupid, but Stiles didn’t want to think about not being _him_. He was among the living for a reason, and he wasn’t inclined to think about just why that was. Stiles was Stiles and for some reason he wasn’t dead when he was supposed to be, that was it. 

“Seeing as you’re dead, I’d assume that hormones were no longer ‘everywhere’ and you’d focus better.” 

“Yeah, well, you’re not dead so you don’t know what this feels like.” He fidgeted with the water bottle for a second before pausing, eyes rolled back as if he were searching for something in his head. “Wait. You _are_ dead. Why do you get to breathe?”

Peter laughed. “I wouldn’t say I was dead. It’s more like…someone used a ‘revive’ spell on me like in one of your games.” 

Derek came down stairs at that moment, nursing a coffee of his own and running a towel through his wet hair. Did he _shower_? In _this_ house? Stiles wrinkled his nose. 

“Do you have a shower in this dump?” he blurted out, desperate for a conversation that was less about resurrection and dead people. 

Derek raised an eyebrow at him but didn’t say anything, choosing to drag the quilt Isaac had wrapped around him off the chair instead. Isaac didn’t manage to get himself out of the blanket in time and fell onto the floor with a loud thunk. 

“This is a serious question. Do you honestly have plumbing? In a house that is more burnt than unburnt?” 

He was ignored again in favor of breakfast.

Peter stopped by some fast food joint on the way over to the Hale House from his hotel room, apparently, since Derek had procured a bag of breakfast sandwiches seemingly out of nowhere. Isaac dug in immediately. Shoveling his face with food was apparently an instinct because Isaac didn’t look awake and aware of his surroundings _at all_. 

Derek tossed Stiles a sandwich before sitting down on the couch next to Stiles with his three or four. The livingroom area was apparently the main hangout place for Derek’s pack. Sleeping, eating, talking. Everything. 

Stiles fidgeted with the sandwich, picking at the lukewarm ham, egg, and cheese bits. He wasn’t hungry at all, and hell, he was dead. Food was going to do nothing for him. 

Derek knocked into Stiles with his shoulder and pointed at the sandwich when Stiles responded. 

“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled before sticking it in his mouth. It felt like he was eating ash. There was no texture, no flavor, and it stuck to his mouth when he tried to swallow it down. It was stupid and made his stomach feel so heavy. 

“So, Stiles, where’d you end up going to last night?” Isaac said around a mouthful of food. 

Derek whipped his head around and his eyes bore into the side of Stiles head. He threw his hands up in defense.

_What?_

“I swear I was here the whole time, staring at the crack on the ceiling all night,” he protested. 

“Why didn’t you sleep, Stiles?” Derek demanded. 

“I’m _dead,_ Derek, if you haven’t noticed.” 

Derek turned back to his remaining sandwich, glaring holes into the sausage. Isaac chugged a bottle of water and wiped his mouth.

“No, I definitely heard you get up last night,” Isaac began. “I thought maybe you had to piss but you don’t do that anymore, right?” 

He didn’t. Stiles didn’t feel the need to eat, drink, sleep, or use the bathroom. He never thought he’d miss that.

“I’m serious. I was here the whole time, staring at that stupid crack.” 

“Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt, Isaac,” Peter interrupted. “Maybe you just dreamt it?” He raised a pointed eyebrow in Isaac’s direction, and Isaac snarled in response.

“Yeah. Sure. I dreamt it.” Despite his words Isaac didn’t look convinced, but he had to have been dreaming. Stiles had been there the whole night, hadn’t moved a bit. But that didn’t ease Stiles any, and Derek looked a little more unnerved than usual. 

Did someone break in in the middle of the night? Did they do something to Stiles? 

Stiles wasn’t sure if he wanted to know the answer. 

“After we’re done eating and cleaned up, Isaac and Stiles you’re coming with me. Peter, hold down the fort.” 

Peter smirked and gave a mock salute to Derek. “Yes, oh benevolent Alpha.” 

Derek didn’t humor him with a response. 

“Wait, why?” Stiles asked, startled out of his focus on the water bottle in his hands. 

Isaac snorted. “It’s a _Thursday_. I have school.” 

“Oh. But I don’t.” Not anymore. 

“Stiles, you’re not going to school,” Derek said. Which answered absolutely nothing. Thanks, Derek, for the enlightening conversation. It really helped. 

“If you are leaving, I would consider changing, Stiles. That hospital smock pattern really brings out your eyes, but I don’t think the public would consider it a stylish choice of wardrobe.” Peter didn’t look up from his laptop when he said it, but Stiles could see a smirk behind the glow of the screen. 

“Um, I know that I’m dead and all, but I’d really like to maintain a sense of fashion in the afterlife too. So please please let me borrow some of your clothes.”

Derek made the sort of grunt that disgruntled parents did when they were humoring their obnoxious kids, and Stiles was ashamed to admit that he heard that noise often growing up. 

Isaac smirked behind his hand and said, “I think you’ve already failed that, Stiles. Your so called fashion sense when you were alive destroyed any chance of you having one in the afterlife.” 

He ended up in a pair of Derek’s pants because they were about the same height and Isaac, even if his waistline fits Stiles better, was a freaking giant. He closed his eyes when he’s handed a pair of boxers because he really doesn’t want to know exactly _whose_ intimate bits he was sharing an indirect frottage session with, but he wasn’t particularly partial to the idea of free-balling it in Derek’s jeans either. Stiles decided he’d rather go with a giant’s shirt than Derek’s because sweat and blood are not his favorite colors.

They were in Derek’s Camaro driving through town before he knew it. Isaac was sulking in the back seat, and Stiles would be willing to say he was even pouting, because Derek had made Stiles sit up front in the passenger seat for “ease.” 

“So, um, where are we actually headed after the kids are in school and all?” Stiles asked and Isaac kicked the back of his seat, noiselessly complaining about being called a kid. It really didn’t help his case any. 

Derek glanced at him out of the side of his shades and pulled into Beacon Hills High School. Derek’s windows were tinted to keep people from looking in, but Stiles couldn’t help but slump down in his seat anyway. 

“Deaton’s,” he eventually answered once Isaac had exited the car. Stiles figured the pause was more for dramatic effect than trying to keep Isaac from hearing because the werewolf superhearing business still worked through cars twenty feet away.

Stiles sighed. If they were going to the animal clinic, Derek had no freaking clue what was going on either.  


* * *

Dr. Deaton always had the sort of calm aura around him that told anyone around him that he was in control, that he knew what was happening, but with every new instrument or magic stone he brought out Stiles grew increasingly worried. If he was being tested by virtually _everything_ Deaton had in his possession, the chances of him knowing anything were slim. No one knew why Stiles was still in control of his body, why he hadn’t moved on. And above all that scared the shit out of Stiles.

Eventually, Dr. Deaton set aside the instruments presumably for his last test, and sighed. It wasn’t a good sigh.

“It would help if we knew why you died, Stiles. To see if it was natural or caused by supernatural means.” 

Stiles shifted uncomfortably on the examination table. “I didn’t even know I was dead,” he said, kicking his legs back and forth absentmindedly off the table.

“An autopsy would help, but…”

“But it would destroy my body and you wouldn’t be able to guarantee what happened to my, um. Is soul the right word? Soul.” 

Dr. Deaton quirked his lips in a half grin and went about reorganizing his things. “Yes, something like that. There are a number of things that could keep your ‘soul’ grounded to your body, things like your own will, a witch, the strong will of those close to you, et cetera.” 

“So if I just… _wish_ that I was gone, would I go?” 

If that’s what it took, Stiles wasn’t sure if he could do it. Sure, his body was dead, but he himself didn’t feel dead. As long as his body still worked he could reach all the goals he made for himself on his mental bucket list. 

Deaton sighed and turned his body so he could look Stiles in the eye. “If your will is what is keeping you here, then yes. But considering that you weren’t aware of your…predicaments, I’d say that—“

“It’s someone else’s doing,” Derek said. Stiles had forgotten he was there. 

“Yes, precisely. All I can say is that you have a tremendous amount of energy in your body and that it is likely that it’s the energy keeping you alive. This energy is not a constant, however.”

“So I’m here, _alive_ , until the energy runs out,” Stiles breathed. 

Deaton nodded but otherwise made no noise, and returned to putting his instruments away. Stiles was thankful of that.

He didn’t know how long he’d be among the living, but he knew he’d die when the energy ran out. How long would his energy last? Would he outlive, so to speak, his friends? His father? The Earth itself? Or would he be more like his mother, who didn’t have more than six months to live after the cancer was discovered. 

Stiles couldn’t do that. He couldn’t watch himself get weaker and weaker, having to rely on his friends and family after being so independent. He couldn’t watch himself die in their eyes. He didn’t want to mourn himself. 

Deaton pulled off his latex gloves with the precision of someone who’d done it for years, and focused his attention on Derek. 

“I don’t mean to pry, but have you heard back from Erica and Boyd yet?” 

Derek shifted uncomfortably in his seat, giving a pointed look at Stiles. Deaton followed his line of vision and made a noise of understanding when his eyes landed on Stiles. 

“What,” Stiles asked, fidgeting under their gaze. 

“Stiles, go wait in the Camaro,” Derek said as he averted his eyes. 

“What? No, no way. If this is a discussion about the alpha stuff, Scott definitely needs to know too, meaning _I_ need to know too.” It didn’t matter that Scott thought he was dead and Stiles hadn’t made contact in the hours he’d been awake and aware. It wasn’t like Stiles wouldn’t _ever_ tell Scott either. He was just curious. 

“Stiles," Derek snarled. Stiles could see his teeth lengthening in his mouth and Stiles knew it was entirely to threaten him because Derek had better control than that. Plus Deaton was a total badass so he’d come to Stiles’ rescue if Derek ever did lose control in his office. 

“Look, I’m staying here. I’m a walking talking dead person so it’s not like you can threaten me with anything.” Stiles was confident he had this in the bag. 

“How would you like to be a walking talking dead _head_ after I rip your throat out with my teeth? Huh?” 

“I’d, uh, I’d really rather not, y’know, be separated from my body and all that.”

“Then go wait in the car.” 

Stiles frowned at Derek as he pulled himself off the examination table, but reluctantly complied. He debated staying at the door and listening in, but he heard Derek shout, “Leave!” and he knew he wasn’t talking to Deaton. Stupid werewolf hearing. 

The car unlocked almost as soon as he reached it and Stiles cursed Derek’s hearing under his breath. It could be worse though. Derek could have made Stiles wait in the parking lot _outside_ the Camaro. But Stiles wished Derek gave him the keys to unlock it himself so he could take the Camaro for a joy ride in retaliation for kicking him out of the discussion. And, well, Stiles just really wanted to drive the Camaro. 

He opened the door and sat down with a huff, angrily glaring holes into the dashboard. 

“I’m in the freaking car now,” he shouted and Derek answered his yell by locking the doors. Stiles frowned. He didn’t have to use his freaking keyring to lock the doors. Stiles could very easily reach over to the button on the passenger door and lock it himself. He wasn’t a child or an invalid. He could take care of himself. 

Stiles decided giving the glove box a sharp enough kick to leave a dirty shoe print on it was going to have to be punishment enough for then, and Derek decided the best response to that would be to hit the panic button on his ring and scare the ever-loving-Jesus out of Stiles. 

“I think you should be focusing more on that conversation you thought wasn’t worth my time.” There was no response from Derek so Stiles figured he probably did just that. Or he just didn’t have a means to express his response with the limited functions he could do with the remote on his keyring. 

It wasn’t fair. There Stiles was, _dead_ , and still considered just as useless when he was human. A dead-alive human should be considered just as supernatural as freaking werewolves, he decided. He was insanely jealous of the things werewolves could do. They were practically invincible, smokin’ in the looks department, and athletic. They didn’t exactly have a winning personality, except maybe in Scott’s case at times, but Stiles could live with that. He could _have_ lived with that, had he accepted the bite. 

But he didn’t, and he was never sure if he regretted that decision or not. It was too late now, anyway. His time was up. Stiles was going to die whenever the energy business stopped being so animating, and who the hell ever heard of an undead werewolf? That was the stuff crazy was made of. 

Above all it hurt knowing that no one trusted him. He came to Derek needing answers, help, and Derek returned the favor by kicking him out of the supernatural creature games. Like freaking Rudolph, but at least he had a glowing nose. Stiles was just dead. 

When Derek came back, Stiles didn’t say anything. He wanted to talk, try and get his mind off the fact that he was dead and at some point he was going to be completely gone, but knowing Derek didn’t trust him kept him from speaking. His hands were shaking in his lap where they were clenching the fabric of Derek’s jeans, and he was so _so_ angry, but he pinched his lips shut and kept quiet. The worst part of it was that he doesn’t even know why he’s so angry. It’s just there bubbling under his skin, threatening to spill over if he thought about things too hard, thought about dying. 

“We’re going to see Scott after school gets out since he was the last person to see you before you died,” Derek eventually said. Stiles noticed he looked concerned about something, worrying his lip while he drove, but he didn’t care. If Stiles was supposed to care Derek shouldn’t have left him out, and he was missing out because Stiles was _great_ at caring. 

Especially when it took his mind off the fact that he was dying. Dead. One and the same. 

“No,” Stiles grit out. He was afraid to see Scott. 

It felt a lot like he was in a waiting room at the dentist’s office. He was on time for his appointment so he figured it would only be a few minutes wait, so he didn’t see the point in sitting down. He’d be sitting down getting his teeth worked on soon enough anyway. But then ten, fifteen minutes pass and he still hadn’t sat down. At that point it would be stupid to sit down because as soon as he did, he’d be called. And he wasn’t going to do that to Scott. He wasn’t going to tell Scott that he wasn’t as dead as he thought, sit down, only to die right after. He would rather die first before Scott ever found out, that way it would hurt less and Stiles wouldn’t have to see his friend’s face. 

“What do you mean, _no_. Stiles this isn’t a discussion.”

“I mean no. We’re not seeing Scott.” 

Derek snorted and his hands tightened on the steering wheel, turning his knuckles white with the pressure. Stiles wished he dented the steering wheel so he’d be able to laugh at something, even if it was at the expense of Derek’s car. 

“Fine. But we’re seeing him tomorrow.” 

Stiles didn’t answer. He refused to. Instead he turned towards the window and angled himself so he couldn’t see Derek at all in the reflection. Come tomorrow he would argue meeting with Scott again, but he’d won this battle and he was going to bask in the glory for a bit. 

He was scared to feel that if anything, the rage itching under his skin had only gotten worse.  


* * *

Stiles was still angry when he marched up the steps to the Hale House. Peter was there, he could see the car, but it was only noonish so Isaac wasn’t back from school yet. Derek trailed behind him, uncharacteristically quiet for the amount of noise and destruction Stiles was making as he kicked at the steps and railing. 

Peter looked up from a table near the entrance, raising an eyebrow at their appearances. 

“Oh good, you’re back, and judging by your faces, you’re back with some terrible news. But. I’m afraid I can’t stay. I’m heading to the hospital to do some research.”

Derek huffed and shut the front door. “You mean flirting.” 

Peter shut his laptop and began to slide it into its case, chuckling. 

“Well yes, that too,” he said. 

Stiles glanced between them, confusion momentarily replacing the burn to _hurt_ things biting at his flesh. Who flirts at a _hospital_? Was it some sort of strange werewolf thing to pick up future brides at a place of sick? 

“Wait, why would you go to the hospital for flirting?” Stiles asked, wrinkling his nose up.

Derek looked at Stiles out of the corner of his eye and struggled not to facepalm, which Stiles only knew he was struggling with because he _did_ do it. With jilted movements. He sighed exasperatedly and collapsed on the couch Stiles laid on the night before. He might have said something along the lines of, “Now you’ve done it,” but Stiles didn’t have supernatural hearing so he wasn’t sure. 

Peter, on the other hand, looked overjoyed. 

“There’s a fine lady who works their with soft skin and fine hair and the most _delectable_ scent.” Peter pauses to sigh. “Of course it would be better if the package didn’t include Scott, but what can a man in love do?” 

Stiles frowned and Derek whispered something like, “More like lust,” into a book Stiles hadn’t seen him pick up. Then it hit him. He only knew one Scott and that Scott had a mom that worked at the hospital.

“You mean Scott _McCall_? As in Scott’s _mom_? That is _so_ gross.” 

Scott’s mom was like a mom to him, and thinking about moms getting jiggy with it was not on Stiles’ to-do list. He personally liked to think himself a cabbage patch kid, garden-grown and ready for pick-up when a couple wanted a special little bundle of joy. But Stiles especially did not want to think of her with _Peter_. The guy who had tried to kill Scott’s girlfriend’s family and get Scott to kill with him. 

Derek spoke before Peter got the chance to. “Yes, now if you have something important to say that isn’t about Melissa McCall, say it, other wise leave like you want to.” 

Stiles was pretty sure Derek was just as uncomfortable thinking about Peter and Scott’s mom making the beast with two backs too. He certainly wasn’t as mature as he pretended to be. 

Peter rolled his eyes and mimed zipping his lips at Derek before stepping out the door. Derek waited until the car started up before he said anything else. 

“Come here,” he said, motioning at the empty seat on the couch next to him. He wasn’t even looking at Stiles, eyes trained on the book in his hand. 

Stiles could feel the anger easing back around him like a comfortable skin. Apparently it was “Derek always knows better than Stiles” time, and Stiles got the urge to punch the condescension out of Derek. Make him pay for all the mocking and physical harm Derek had caused while Stiles was still alive because Stiles was dead and he couldn’t be hurt anymore. He could win. 

“I don’t want to,” Stiles grit out between clenched teeth. He felt like a petulant child, biting back with words and trying to get a rise out of a parent. Derek was no parent though. He couldn’t even take care of his pack, let alone a child. Boyd and Erica ran off because he sucked, Stiles could do it too. 

Only he couldn’t. He was dead and had nowhere to go. Stiles was utterly alone.

Derek scoffed and shut the book in his hands. It was old and worn and Stiles couldn’t make out a title, but it was probably an instruction booklet on how to interact with people because Derek sucked at that. 

“What is your _problem_ , Stiles? I just want you to sit down.” 

_What was his problem?_ He had no idea why he was around. Everyone he loved thought he was dead, which wasn’t even a lie. What was he supposed to do as a dead person? It wasn’t like Derek had much use for him because he excluded him from discussions that were actually pertinent to Scott or Stiles no matter how indirect it was. No one seemed to want him around. Or how bout the simple fact that he was dead and dying? Derek could take his freaking pick.

Stiles didn’t say anything though. He pinched his lips together until they were nothing but a thin white line and sat stiffly on the couch. Derek’s claw on his wrist may have had something to do with it though. 

“Thank you,” Derek said stiffly and returned his hand to his thigh, where he nervously tapped a beat. 

Stiles would’ve snorted if he could breathe. 

Derek glanced at Stiles then at the floor, then back again to Stiles’ arm, and then to the left. What? Did Stiles have something on his face? Stiles would’ve found his nervousness funny if he didn’t want to punch it off his face so bad.

He was about to stand up and leave when Derek finally started talking. About freaking time. 

“Look, why won’t you see Scott?” He began, scratching at the back of his neck. He wasn’t even looking at Stiles. That book was certainly nothing about how to interact with people because Derek was failing. 

“He’s your friend and I’m sure he’d like to see you,” he continued. If Stiles knew any better he was talking from experience, but hell, Derek lost his entire family. Stiles would probably try and bring back his mom if he could, and he didn’t even lose everyone. He still had his dad. 

Derek turned to look at Stiles then. “Plus we need to find out why you are here and if you are a danger.” 

Yeah, right. A danger to _who_. Stiles was still the human he was before, only dead and doing less alive-y things, like breathing. Chances were he was probably slower if rigor mortis had anything to do with it. 

Derek shifted, turning his body more towards Stiles. The nervous tap against his leg started again, Stiles noticed. 

“Stiles I need an answer. You can’t avoid Scott forever.” 

He could and he planned to. No one wanted him there, dead, and he was going to die dignified, like the dog his neighbors had when he was seven that wandered under his porch to die. Then no one would be sad. 

“Sure I can,” Stiles said, but he couldn’t look Derek in the face when he said it. 

“Stiles,” he heard from behind him. If anyone sounded like a cross between a kicked puppy and an angry lion, it would’ve been Derek at that point. But he had no right to feel down. He wasn’t dead. Derek didn’t know anything at all.

“Look,” Stiles snarled, whipping his head around. Derek startled back a little, like he wasn’t expecting it. “My mom died of cancer, remember that? Yeah, I know what it freaking feels like when someone knows they’re going to die. I watched her get weaker and weaker; lose her strength and her life. Do you _know_ how bad it wrecked me to watch her like that? Do you know what it did to my dad? I refuse to do that to Scott. Or anyone. I would’ve been a lot happier I think if she just died. But watching her die? That was too much. You just imagine watching _your_ family burn in that fire for months. Sometimes you think, hey, the firemen are here and the fire looks like it’s under control. But it isn’t and it doesn’t ever get under control. It just burns and burns and your loved one dies. No. I won’t do it.” 

Derek’s claws were out and he looked furious, but Stiles wasn’t afraid. He was dead and he couldn’t die anymore than he already was. He wanted Derek to see and he wouldn’t. Stiles was convinced he refused to, because Derek was alpha and Derek knew best. Fuck Scott and Stiles and anyone else. 

“You’re really selfish, you know that? You aren’t the only one involved in this, Stiles.” 

“Oh, well you sure make me feel like a part of the team then, Derek, because so far all I know is that I’m dead and you won’t include me.” 

“And what if I did, Stiles? What if there’s a reason I don’t? We don’t know why you’re here. For all I know it’s not actually you and the moment I tell you something it’ll all blow up in my face.” 

“You already said I smell like me so why wouldn’t it be me?” Stiles’ cried out. The argument was stupid. Derek was stupid. Why couldn’t he understand and just leave Stiles alone about it? Why couldn’t he just include him? He was dead not dumb or dangerous. 

“You smell like nothing, Stiles. Like absolutely nothing.” 

Derek stood, knuckles white on his clenched hands plastered to his sides. His body language screamed that the conversation was done and Stiles did nothing to continue it. He smelled like nothing. Stiles wasn’t alive and he was nothing. Dust to dust and ash to ash.

Stiles watched Derek’s back as he stormed out of the room and outside into the forest. The book Derek left behind was just a book of poems by some Ed guy and Stiles doesn’t know why he expected what he did.

Peter came back before Derek did, when Stiles was halfway into a losing battle with himself about whether or not he should read the book of poems out of boredom, when poems had done nothing but put him to sleep when he was alive. He’d already read the handwritten note on the inside, something fairly boring. It was just a dad entrusting a book to his daughter, _Lissa_ , which Stiles thought was the dumbest name ever even though he went by _Stiles_. Stiles expected some torrid love note on the inside and had entertained himself with stories about the couple the note entailed for at least an hour before he actually read it. 

The sound of a car pulling into the driveway made him nearly jump with joy because Stiles was not equipped to deal with boredom. And hell, he’d take glaring at Derek and imagining his fist in his face over boredom any day. For Derek’s sake at least, it had been a good thing that it was Peter instead. 

“I haven’t seen that book in ages. Considering the use it got while Ally was alive I thought it would’ve burned in the fire.” 

Stiles answered by carefully tossing it on the table. He really didn’t care about a stupid poetry book. Peter didn’t care either way, having moved on from that point of conversation to moan about how his plans were foiled by nurses, or something. 

Needless to say Stiles was completely ready for Isaac to come back from school when he did, even if Derek was following close behind. What Stiles wasn’t ready for, however, was Scott’s voice shouting his name just before something slammed into him. 

Freaking _hell_ , Stiles was going to kill Derek.


	2. Chapter 2

Scott’s arms crushed Stiles to his chest and Stiles was stuck trying to decide if he should return the hug because it was his best friend, or leave his hands in the half-hug limbo they were in because he didn’t want to be reminded of how he left his best friend. 

“Stiles! I can’t believe you’re alive because I saw you in your bed and I was so afraid, but here you are and I can’t believe it. Oh, Stiles.” 

He wanted to cry but his body kept him from doing so. His stupid dead body. And Scott continued to nuzzle into Stiles’ neck, clearly happy and excited. 

Stiles knew the exact moment Scott figured it out, when he broke his friend’s heart for the second time. Scott froze against him, his heart catching for a beat or two, and Stiles felt him take a careful sniff or two against his shoulder. He pulled his face back and searched Stiles’ face for some sort of answer, his nose wrinkled in confusion. 

“Wha?” Scott started and Stiles only nodded his head. 

“Yeah, I’m,” he began, “I’m dead. Still, I mean.” It was painful to get out and Scott’s confusion only served to remind him of his own inadequacies, his dumb gravelly dead person voice, his lack of heartbeat and breath, and his stupid nothing smell. 

“But—you, I mean. We can fix this right? You’re not _dead_ dead, right?” 

Scott looked so hopeful, so sincere, and Stiles couldn’t break his heart. The words caught in his throat and poked painfully into his larynx, replacing his feelings with their sharp, heavy weight. Truth was, he didn’t know. The Doctor said he had until the energy ran out, but he didn’t know if he could be revived, like Peter or something. He was scared to know what happened if he tried. 

“Scott, we actually have some questions if you’re okay with that. About Stiles.” Derek’s hand was large against Scott’s shoulder, which had curled in at the weight of Stiles’ silence. Stiles was only a little thankful for Derek’s interruption. The whole thing was completely his fault so he was obligated to clean up any messes, and considering Derek had gone against his word about not bringing Scott in, Stiles intended to make a lot of them. 

Scott nodded his head blankly, shrugging off Derek’s hand. “Yeah, okay,” he murmured and his tone drove a stake into Stiles. The crestfallen look was completely his fault. He knew it would happen and he couldn’t prevent it. 

“Stiles says you were the last person he remembers interacting with before he was found dead. What happened? Was there anyone suspicious around?” 

Scott glanced at Stiles out of the corner of his eye, confusion written on his face. “Wait, you guys don’t know what happened to him?” 

Derek shook his head no and Stiles looked down at the floor. He didn’t want to hear this conversation. 

“Well I don’t know why you’re asking me about it. I—I.” Scott paused and swallowed, his adam’s apple bobbing under his skin. “I was over at Allison’s until almost midnight. Her dad was out hunting or something and I, I’m so _dumb_. Stiles was dying or whatever while I was busy and I could’ve stopped it. I know I could’ve!”

“Stop what, Scott?” Derek looked intrigued, and maybe a little excited at finally getting the answers he wanted. 

“I don’t know! Just keep him from dying. I wanted to at least try, y’know? But instead I found him the next morning pale and cold and covered in his own…yeah.” 

It became apparent that Scott offered no help to figuring out what was going on. Derek was frustrated and Scott was working himself up into a frenzy. And Stiles? Stiles was just dead. 

“So you didn’t help me sneak back into my house Tuesday night?” Stiles asked, and Scott froze, like he forgot Stiles was there. It wasn’t his fault he had no heartbeat, no scent, no signs of life. And clearly Scott wanted to forget about him enough to actually do it when he was in the same room, and that hurt. 

“No, I, like I said I was at Allison’s. We were studying and then, well, you _know_. I was going to sneak out before dinner, but her dad called and one thing led to another.” 

So what was Stiles remembering? Derek gave Stiles a look that asked the same thing.

* * *

A dejected Scott left shortly after and Stiles watched him go, pedaling on his bike back to his house or maybe Allison’s. He wanted to reassure Scott before he left, hug him and tell him it wasn’t his fault that Stiles died, but he couldn’t. He still felt so bitter that Scott would ignore him when he was dying like he did. Allison was his world, Stiles understood that, but he thought Scott would care enough to notice maybe. Even if it was impossible to stop. 

And Stiles had no freaking clue about what was going on. Was he dead-dead? In Hell? He may have lied a little to protect his dad and he jerked off a lot to various types of porn, but that didn’t mean he deserved to go to Hell. Sure he never really believed in God, but living this _whatever_ it was had to be Hell because Stiles couldn’t see feeling this miserable otherwise. His body was dead and his best friend provided no comfort to him. Sounded a whole lot like Hell, even if it was missing the burning fires.

“Stiles,” Derek said, and he had no idea what he caused with that one word.

Stiles snapped, anger that had been itching to get out boiled over, scalding everything it touched. He pushed Derek up against the wall next to the door and Derek let it happen, not that Stiles noticed. He was on a power surge. He was dead and he was invincible, the rage coloring his thoughts. 

“Why the _fuck_ did you bring Scott here, Derek? You _promised_ , Derek.”

Stiles threw his fist up and punched Derek in the chest, arm, and jawline. Derek hardly looked like it was affecting him and that made Stiles more furious. He wasn’t weak. He was dead but he wasn’t some stupid defenseless human so why wouldn’t his punches work? 

Derek didn’t answer and no matter how hard Stiles punched, he wasn’t bruising his pale skin either. Stupid werewolves and their stupid fast healing. Stupid Stiles and his stupid dead human bag of bones. His hands stilled against Derek’s chest and Stiles felt Derek’s impossibly warm hands rest over them, scalding his insides with their intentions. 

“What’s the matter, Stiles?” Derek asked and Stiles felt his words vibrate against his hands. He wondered when his vocal chords had stopped doing that, when he noticed it. Probably when rigor mortis began to set in. 

Stiles pressed his hands into Derek’s chest, trying to do some sort of damage with his blunt fingernails but Derek didn’t react in the way he wanted. He just pressed Stiles hands closer to his chest and held them there. Stiles could feel the ghosts of hot angry tears boil in his eyes, but they weren’t really there. It wasn’t like a dead person could cry. 

“I’m just,” Stiles began but cut if off short at his voice. The rawness reminded him of years back when his mom had died, when he had stayed up late screaming in her bed trying to smell her scent in bed sheets that she hadn’t slept in for months. “I’m dead.” 

Derek didn’t say anything and Stiles wasn’t sure if he liked the silence. It made his thoughts echo in his head and he didn’t want to hear, “You’re dead,” more than once. Hell, he didn’t want to hear it at all. 

But he was, and it was a bite so hard to chew. It left him feeling so empty inside. 

“We should get this cleaned up,” Derek eventually said and he pushed himself off the wall and out of Stiles' reach, squeezing Stiles’ right hand. 

Stiles was confused for a second until he looked down at the hand that had been caught in Derek’s. The knuckles were split open, the force from Derek’s collar bone having cut them, and three fingers were at least dislocated if not totally broken. Stiles sighed at the cuts, not surprised to see the next layer of his skin but no blood. Dead people don’t clot, don’t bleed. And above all he couldn’t help thinking that the mess looked like his heart. But at least it wouldn’t itch because there was nothing to scab over it. 

“Yeah,” he muttered and pulled the hand to his chest. He followed Derek upstairs. 

It turns out there was a bathroom up there, though it was permanently ashen and half of a wall was missing. The toilet was a strange mix of charred black and coral pink, and had several cinderblocks on the lid, presumably telling people not to use it. The sink was literally just a bowl on the ground with a spigot like thing a few feet above. Stiles was surprised to see that the shower was in complete working order. Apparently Derek valued being clean far more than he actually showed it, considering the amount of dirty, possibly bloody, wife beaters he wore. 

Derek gestured for Stiles to sit down on top of the cinderblocks and turned around to rummage through a plastic bin next to the shower. Stiles shuffled over and squirmed around on the toilet lid until the cinderblocks were at least a little comfortable under his butt, hand still cradled against his chest. 

Stiles expected it to hurt when his fingers were popped back into position but it didn’t. Basic touch was okay, like, Stiles could feel the warmth from Derek’s hands seep into his, but he didn’t feel pain at all, just the gentle pull of his ligaments being moved into place. How long until his nerves were completely dead? Not breathing was one thing, but not being able to feel his feet touch the earth, grounding him, or return a hug? That scared him more than anything. How long until he was nothing more than a solid ghost?

Derek reached down beside the toilet and picked up where he put a needle and some fishing pole line after rummaging through a few more bins. It wasn’t the thick wire needed for stitches but Stiles figured that it had been the only thing suitable in the house. Werewolves didn’t need stitches; they healed too fast. Stiles probably didn’t need stiches either, but for the opposite reason. His skin would never mesh back together and it didn’t need to. Dead people had nothing to keep in. 

Stiles could probably stich up his knuckles himself, but he let Derek do it, gently steadying Stiles’ hand while he pulled Stiles’ skin back in place. 

“I didn’t tell Scott,” Derek said into Stiles’ hand just as he was finishing up. Stiles didn’t know if it was because Derek wanted an easy escape if things escalated again, or if it just took him that long to gather the nerves to speak. Stiles thought it might have been the former because the idea of Derek being anything but broody or angry was a foreign concept. 

He searched for the anger that had been at a constant eight out of ten the last day or so to gain the courage that came with it, but felt nothing. Stiles was defeated. He didn’t feel anything but emptiness, watching as Derek cut the needle from the thread with a claw. Must have been convenient to have claws. 

“Then why was he here?” Stiles asked, pulling his hand to his chest. He didn’t want to see it, the evidence of his outburst and death. If Derek was surprised that he didn’t shout or hit him again, he didn’t show it. 

“Isaac probably. I was the only one sworn to secrecy for the day.” Derek’s lip quirked slightly with his words and he sat back on his haunches, sighing. There were circles under his eyes and tight lines that should never be around the mouth of someone younger than thirty-five. He looked so tired, and Stiles realized how little he knew about what was going on. He didn’t like that one bit. “I told him you didn’t want to see him today but…” 

“It’s Scott,” Stiles finished with a knowing grin. He did ride away on his bike when he left, but Stiles didn’t really think anything of it until then. When Scott got something into his head, something he thought above all was right, he went at it with everything he had. It’s a trait Stiles wished he had, or wished when he was still alive, but Scott was more suited to heroism than Stiles was. Hell, he even got the girl way out of his league, even if there were bumps all along the way. But he had her at least, and all Stiles had done was pine after Lydia. 

“Yeah,” Derek said and stood up. He gestured at something out the bathroom door and Stiles understood. Derek had other crap to do and now that Stiles was “fixed” and seemingly okay, those things had the lead. It was okay, he could be left behind for a little while, even if it made the overwhelming _nothing_ he was feeling stretch and grow until it towered over Stiles. He could wait.

* * *

The rest of the day went okay. He watched Isaac, Peter, and Derek flitter about from room to room doing whatever they did, sat at the table with them while they shoveled food into their respective faces like it was their last meal, and laid back on the couch he’d laid on the night before covered with a quilt that smelled like mothballs and ash, listening to Isaac’s quiet slumbering breaths from the chair next to him. It was like the clock sped up and slowed down at the same time. Stiles felt so lost, so out of place, but time kept moving on whether or not he was ready for it to. 

“You got up again last night,” Isaac said through a yawn, the morning light reflecting off his messy curls. It was petulant sounding, like Isaac was a kid who wanted to say “I told you so,” so bad but wasn’t allowed to. Stiles could hear Derek shuffling around upstairs and figured that was keeping Isaac’s tongue in place. Usually he’d have heard a few insults by now. 

Stiles bit his lip, pulling himself up to sit on the couch. “I didn’t. I mean, I seriously laid here and watched the Hale House deteriorate atom by atom all night.” 

“Sound interesting. Too bad you got up during it.” 

Isaac stood up before Stiles could answer, not that it would ever really stop Stiles. As Isaac’s back disappeared into the next room, Stiles shouted, “I think you may have been dreaming, y’know? Dreamt you were chasing little rabbits and when one jumped behind a bush and rustled the leaves you just thought poor dead Stiles was moving.” Isaac didn’t reply and Stiles totally counted that as a win. 

A floorboard squeaked behind him and Stiles turned to see Derek freshly showered and with his boots in hand. He expected to get angry at him again, like he had been, but there was nothing. Stiles felt too empty to allow any other emotion in. 

“Derek, can I talk to you?” Stiles asked, standing to fold the quilt, even if badly done. 

Derek grunted and sat down in a chair across from him, dropping his boots on the ground, scattering ash and dust. Stiles took that as a yes, even if Derek didn’t actually acknowledge him. 

“I need my laptop.”

Derek looked up then, staring hard at Stiles while his fingers worked to tie his shoe. “Why?” 

“Um, well. I’m dead and am pretty much confined to house arrest because I’ve seen enough movies to know that being seen as the living dead is not a good idea; I’m dead and I don’t know why that is and I’d really like to know; and, y’know, I’ve got a raid planned tomorrow afternoon and since I’m not actually dead-dead I’d like to continue playing my video games?” 

Derek sighed, pinching where his nose met his brows, and Stiles knew he’d won. “Okay. I’ll bring one by but I can’t guarantee that it’ll be yours.”

Okay, not _exactly_ what he wanted, but a start. Borrowed laptops were better than none, and maybe Peter would appreciate it if Stiles could bring Derek into today’s world with something other than cell phones. 

“Um, why not?”

He stood up and walked to the living room door, stopping just before he exited. Stiles wanted to roll his eyes at how dramatic Derek was being, but managed to hold it in. 

“You’re dead and your body’s gone. The authorities don’t know why that is, and after Jackson they’re really curious about what’s going on. So they probably have a number of things confiscated, like your phone.” 

“My phone?”

“Yeah. And just what do you have my number under in that thing because I keep getting texts implying that I’m a cult leader.”

Stiles’ mouth dropped open, gaping like a goldfish, and he honestly didn’t want to answer Derek. Well, if he knew what Derek was under. It tended to change by the week depending on how Stiles felt at the time. Anything from “Should-be-Omega Hale” to “Buttface” to “Alpha Brood” or that one time Stiles got drunk and confessed to Scott that he found Derek attractive and he woke up to find Derek’s name changed to “Tall Dark and Handsome” in his phone. He still doesn’t know if he changed it or if it was Scott.

Derek sighed at his silence and said, “Never mind. If you won’t answer, I don’t want to know.” Stiles watched his back as he left, thanking his deadness that he had no blood in his body to blush. 

* * *

Stiles was bored. Beyond bored. The kind of bored-ness that would’ve killed him if he wasn’t already dead. No one was at the Hale House and he was undying of death causing boredom.

He tried reading some of the books lying around, but contrary to popular belief Derek did not keep around mountains of “How to be a Werewolf” manuals and Derek’s reading choices sucked as far as Stiles was concerned. There were tons of poetry books all by the same guy, and Stiles honestly didn’t care enough to check and see if all were made out to _Lissa_ , love Dad, too. And if they weren’t poetry books, they were war books and considering the number of them Stiles was pretty certain that Derek bought all of those for pleasure reading. Sure, yeah, the action scenes were pretty cool, but Stiles found out fast that most military themed stories had far less action than war politics and war politics were boring as _shit_. So the reading idea maybe only wasted an hour. 

Exploring the Hale House entertained him for less than that though, because seeing a slightly different shape of burnt, ashen room every time he went through a door didn’t really pique his curiosity. 

Snooping won out in the end because who _didn’t_ want to find out the secrets behind the mysterious werewolves of Beacon Hills? Stiles did try to hold off the impulse for a while, he really did, but hell, if he couldn’t die why not try and take advantage of a situation that would normally end in Stiles’ throat ripped out via Derek’s teeth? It was simple math really. 

Stiles had explored enough of the rooms downstairs already to know that it wasn’t worth his time to snoop through stuff down there; they were pretty much only empty rooms with the occasional desk or wardrobe. Upstairs, however, now that was the holy grail of surprises.

Only it wasn’t. 

All but two rooms looked the same as the rooms downstairs, and they were the bathroom and a room with one bed and a mountain of dirty clothes piled next to it. 

The bathroom was simple enough. There were bins lining the walls that contained various first aid stuff, hygienic items, and cleaning supplies. The most risqué thing Stiles found was a tube of Vaseline that would have been a lot funnier if he had found it next to the bed. So overall the bathroom was even more normal than his own, aside from the whole mostly burnt in a fire thing. 

The bedroom, while not quite a goldmine, was the most interesting part of the house. The bed was somewhere between a queen size and a full, and seemed new enough that Stiles knew that it hadn’t been in the fire. The sheets and comforter were tangled at the foot of the bed and it was so funny to Stiles because he never pictured Derek to be that _normal_. Stiles was surprised he slept, let alone left the bed unmade. And, well, he may have gotten a little revenge for Derek’s standoffish attitude lately via his naked ass on Derek’s bed. Somewhere in a death-wish part of himself wanted Derek to be able to smell it because ignorance wasn’t quite as funny as Derek being upset because he put his face where Stiles’ ass was, but he apparently smelled like nothing. It couldn’t happen.

There was a tissue box on the bedside table nestled among what appeared to be various maps and shopping lists, which made Stiles laugh for at least ten minutes because Derek didn’t jerk off. He was too uptight to be doing that. Plus all the tissues in the nearby waste basket were covered in blood, or at least the top layer was because Stiles wasn’t that dedicated to snooping, and Stiles was pretty certain that Derek’s genetic material was made of children’s tears and not blood. He was too broody for it to be anything other than children’s tears. 

He started digging through pants pockets next. Mostly he found small change and a few more shopping lists, but there was something stiff and papery in one of the pockets. Curiously, Stiles reached in and found a thick piece of folded paper. The edges were worn so it wasn’t newly folded, and Stiles wondered if it was in that condition because it was that well loved or if it wasn’t well taken care of and stayed in pants pockets for days. 

Stiles uncurled it, revealing a photo only a little bigger than the normal print size. There were maybe fifteen people in it standing in front of a big house, all smiles and in barbeque clothing. It was clearly a happy occasion and the house looked _so_ familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. 

It wasn’t until he started reading the names listed on the back that he realized what the photo was of. 

The Hale House. It was a photo of the Hale family, with Derek, the youngest of the bunch smiling bright and friendly next to a girl Stiles was pretty sure was Laura and in front of an older woman, maybe his mom. 

Stiles’ undead hearing was nothing like werewolf hearing, but he didn’t have to listen hard to hear two people arguing as they approached the house. He was still up in Derek’s room, searching for dirty secrets in clothing bins next to the bed when it happened, so he ended up sprinting downstairs to try and reach the couch before the other two reached the door. He barely made it, sitting down and grabbing one of the books he’d tossed there in his search for something more interesting just as the door began to open, and Stiles learned that being dead was good for one thing at least. They couldn’t tell he was out of breath or anything from running because he didn’t breathe. 

Derek walked in first, Stiles’ laptop clenched tightly in hands and his eyebrows furrowed in one of the angriest looking glares Stiles had seen on his face since Stiles accused him of Laura’s murder and the whole school terror thing. At first Stiles thought it was because of him, that Derek heard him upstairs because _hello_ , werewolf hearing, but when Jackson followed him in looking just as upset looking he quickly erased that idea. 

Jackson had been sort of a sore point around Scott after his status upgraded from “scary killer lizard” to werewolf. He wasn’t exactly modest about his newfound athletic ability and the verbal bullying had come back tenfold when Jackson knew that Scott couldn’t easily beat him to a pulp. Plus seeing Lydia on his arm made Stiles ache deep in his gut, because no matter how much as he tried, getting over a crush that lasted as long as it did wasn’t as easy as he wanted to be. And well, Scott had his back about that, avoiding Jackson to keep the hurt off of Stiles’ face. He was convinced Allison was the girl for him and no matter what she would always come back, but Stiles had been, was still in his heart, convinced Lydia was the same for him. Only Lydia never came in the first place, let alone came back. She was Jackson’s, and Jackson hers. 

“Derek, I don’t ‘need you,’ ” Jackson snarled, slamming the door behind him. “You need _me_ , and honestly, I don’t care. I haven’t had any trouble, and in fact, I’ve been _perfect_ , so I really don’t see any reason or initiative for why I should join your pack.” 

Derek’s upper lip rose in a sneer, showing off a sharpened werewolf canine. “Jackson, you’re an omega, a lone wolf. You’re not an alpha without a pack and you will get _ripped apart_ by the new pack in town if you don’t join me.” 

Stiles almost snorted, but managed to keep it in. They hadn’t noticed him yet which was completely preposterous. Well. It was until Stiles remembered that he was nothing but a voice in a body that should’ve rotted days ago. 

Jackson growled at him, raising his shoulders to make himself bigger than Derek, and Derek did not respond well to that. He clenched and unclenched his hands, claws out. Stiles knew he had good control, that this was all on purpose. Derek actually wanted to _hurt_ Jackson. Yeah. That was _definitely_ going to get Jackson to join Derek’s pack. Threatening. 

And Jesus, Stiles’ baby was still in Derek’s hands. Yeah no, laptops were not getting in a fight between werewolves. 

“Hey, hey!” he shouted from his spot on the couch, and Jackson jumped in surprise. He was a really bad werewolf if he couldn’t sense his surroundings well. Derek turned to look at him, schooling his features into something more human. 

“Stiles, what the hell?” Jackson asked, eyebrows near his hairline. He recovered quickly, however, his next set of words just as condescending as usual. “Did you like my temporarily dead idea so much you decided to try it? I know I’m worth idolizing, but this is a little much, don’t you think?” 

“Yeah, that’s exactly it. I died because I wanted to be _just_ like you, Jackson.” Stiles rolled his eyes and Jackson snorted in response. 

“Well you sure don’t look dead.”

“Thank you captain obvious. I was _certain_ that this air stuff around me was actually dirt and that I’m really six feet under, pushing daisies. Jackson you’re a really freaking terrible werewolf, you know that?”

Derek smirked, giving Jackson a pointed look as if to say, “ _See?_ You do need me.” Jackson effortlessly ignored it, and Stiles wouldn’t be surprised if his hair converted the look into something like, “Geez, Jackson, I’ve always admired your cheekbones,” in some sort of twisted version of the I’m-rubber-you’re-glue playground rule.

“Jackson, I have no heartbeat, no scent. I don’t breathe. But for some reason, I’m still around. And no I’m not a werewolf or a kanima or something.” 

“Well, I always knew you were a freak, Stiles, but I’m pretty sure this undead business takes the cake.” 

Well, wasn’t Jackson just trying to grate on _every one_ of Stiles’ nerves? 

“I’m pretty sure your face will take the cake when it has _my fist in it._ ”

Okay, well, that wasn’t the best comeback but it was at least still threatening. Punching was dangerous, even if it was compared to cake. Stiles didn’t work well when he was frustrated and under pressure. Everyone’s gift had a limit and apparently that was Stiles’ mouth’s limit. 

“Okay, well, as enlightening as this conversation is I’m going to have to go. I’d say see you later but I really don’t want to see either of you again.” 

Jackson left, and while his last few words were something he’d have said when Stiles was still alive, they hurt. Jackson didn’t want to see him again. He was dead, wasn’t supposed to be alive. He was a _freak_ and no one wanted to see him. And hell, he’d rather spend ten years alone and bored in the Hale House than feel this way, feel dead. 

Derek pressed the laptop to Stiles’ chest until it pushed Stiles into the cushions and sat down in the chair across from him. He sighed into his hands, clearly upset or frustrated about something, and Stiles suddenly remembered how _human_ Derek was. He left his bed unmade and threw his dirty clothes on the floor. Derek wasn’t always some big bad werewolf to depend on, trying to fight the bad guy of the day. 

It wasn’t a feeling Stiles wanted to dwell on. Here he was, dead, and somewhat relating to Derek because of that deadness. Derek was untouchable because he was supernatural, a werewolf, and now that Stiles was dead, supernatural in a way, he thought he was on par for the course. But no, Derek was too human, to alive, for that now. 

Stiles shifted uncomfortably, opening his laptop on his knees and turning it on. Derek looked up, moving his arms into a forced expression of casualness. 

“The police report on your laptop was interesting,” Derek suddenly said, and Stiles froze where his hands were, a half typed google search on the screen. 

“What?” he managed to get out, and Stiles knew that if he had any color in his face it would have drained out. Outside of the, y’know, fear of _dying_ , he always had this fear of having people see just what he did on his laptop after he died. There was always comfort in knowing that he would be too dead to care about their reaction, but hell. Stiles was still somewhat alive and he was mortified. 

It wasn’t like he did anything unusual for a teenager. He’d have a few hundred, maybe thousand, more searches on werewolves and the supernatural, but he looked up and obsessed about _loads_ of weird things that didn’t have anything to do with his or Scott’s survival so it wasn’t that weird. Maybe. And the porn on there was normal too, even if one could easily see the progression of straight porn to male male female threesome porn to a steady mix of straight and gay porn in his downloads folder. He did try and tell his dad once, so it wasn’t like it was a surprise. But even so, there was no way he would ever want to find out what people he loved platonically got off to. It was bad enough knowing how bad Scott was for Allison. The online gaming wouldn’t have been a problem either since his dad was well aware of that part of him. 

It was the things that he may have searched on a whim one day, or for research for Scotts benefit, that scared him. Some days it was innocent, like googling the history of Batman, but other days it was something strange like knotting. Which he did all for Scott, who was panicking about a bump at the base of his penis and Stiles, being the good friend he was, looked up what it could’ve been and got _knotting_. Stiles brought him the idea of knotting and Scott told him the bump was just an ingrown pubic hair. Stiles bought him a pair of tweezers and they never spoke of the incident again. 

Derek smirked. “Yeah, security was tight but I had just enough time to pick up the laptop, read the reports, and exit the station without notice.” 

“You stole my laptop from the _police station_? Oh my God, Derek. I’m on the internet and they can trace where my laptop is and holy God they’re going to find me not-dead.” _And Derek knew far more about his internet history than he was comfortable thinking about._

“You’re a strange kid, that’s all I’ve got to say. Never knew you were into that.”

“Is this about the knotting thing because I can explain—wait.” It was then that Stiles noticed the half grin on Derek’s face. He was freaking _joking._ “Are you making a _joke?_ ” 

He gave Derek a scrutinous onceover. Derek didn’t joke about things, didn’t make jokes. He hid in teenaged boys’ closets and popped out of nowhere to give advice no one wanted (but Stiles maybe a little bit agreed with a lot of the advice he didn’t want to be given. Or rather the advice that Scott didn’t want to be given). But jokes? No. That wasn’t a Derek thing to do.

“No, I’m completely serious,” Derek said, face schooled to be as blank as possible. Like he was at a funeral but without the mourning. Stiles believed him for a moment, just a second before he realized that it was sarcasm. 

“You’re an asshole,” he murmured to the screen, hitting enter on his google search for “what happens after death?” 

“It was in your room. The police didn’t have it.” Derek’s voice was quiet, reserved almost. He tipped his head back to lean over the top of the back of his chair, looking both tense and relaxed between its arms. 

Stiles grunted in response, relieved that no one had actually seen the contents of his searches. He glanced through a page or two of google results to see that everything was about religion, or the rarer death experience of someone. That was interesting but Stiles didn’t die and come back to his live body. He didn’t float away or see a garden or anything. Stiles simply went to sleep and woke up dead. 

He edited his google search to “what happens to the body after death,” and he was in the midst of reading about the body decay that happens after rigor mortis when Derek spoke again.

“Knotting?” he asked and Stiles nearly died. Or undied. His heart definitely made a feeble attempt to start again. 

“Oh God,” he muttered, pulling the laptop up close to his face so he could hide behind the screen. He wasn't blushing because he physically couldn’t, but old habits die hard and he was feeling so embarrassed that he wished he were actually six feet under. 

“It was for Scott, okay!” he blurt out and instantly regretted it. 

“ _What_?” Derek asked and Stiles refused to look at his face.

“I don’t think there’s any way I can fix this without digging myself into a deeper hole so we’re just going to pretend it never came up, okay?” 

“Sounds good to me,” Derek answered and Stiles wants to reply that it was his fault anyway, for bringing it up again. Stiles was perfectly happy pretending it never happened in the first place. Derek was the one who went fishing. 

Derek grabbed the book Stiles had pretended to read earlier off the floor and presumably started reading. Stiles turned back to his article and despite the disgusting subject matter he didn’t feel like puking at all. Which was unusual. And hell, he’d puke for several days straight if it meant he had a live body again. 

* * *

Stiles had narrowed down where exactly he was on the dead body scale when Isaac got home. He was just after rigor mortis but right before the actual decay of his body started, and Stiles was scared to find out if he would ever reach that point. Being a walking talking dead body was one thing, but being a walking talking body with a trail of green skin falling behind him as he walked, like some sort of zombie leprosy? Wasn’t exactly on Stiles’ to do list. Ever, in fact. 

He tried to use a supernatural forum to narrow down what was actually happening to him but all he got were comments about how suicide was not the option and that he should seek help. Stiles was frustrated with the answers, but wasn’t exactly surprised when he looked at the phrasing of the original description. “I’m dead and I shouldn’t still be alive” sort of invited those sorts of comments, but it wasn’t like he had much to work with. 

Stiles might have continued googling, and Derek might have continued reading his book, had Isaac not come in clearly upset about something. 

“Did you guys see it? There’s a body. Out there.” Isaac gestured outside, at the porch, looking a little green around the gills. Derek rushed out, and Stiles thought he saw some confusion on his face, but it was quickly schooled into anger. He figured it was for Isaac’s benefit. And alpha couldn’t be seen as weak, he guessed. 

If Stiles was alive he would’ve thrown up. There was a deer on the porch. A _dead_ deer, its stomach slashed and its innards pouring out of it’s body cavity and onto the ashen porch. 

“Holy God, what _is_ that?” Stiles asked. It was completely disgusting and there was no telling how long it had been out there. They were lucky it was November and cool out, because if it had been any warmer the deer would have rotted faster and there would be a much heavier stench coming off of it. Not that it really affected Stiles one way or another. But to be honest he would smell that smell for the rest of his life if it meant he could be alive again. 

Derek turned towards Stiles, hand in front of his nose. God, Stiles couldn’t imagine what it smelt like to Derek with his werewolf senses. Hell, could he hear maggots or whatever crawling inside it too? Whatever he was sensing, it was apparently horrible because Derek was looking a little green around the edges, even if he was showing a face of perfect stoicism.

“It’s a challenge,” he said, turning back to the mess. 

A challenge? Like a wolf challenge? Someone obviously didn’t want Derek to be alpha. 

“Jackson?” Stiles asked. It didn’t seem like something he would do, but Stiles wasn’t sure just how being a werewolf effected him. 

Derek shook his head no and pointed at the innards dripping on the porch. Stiles came closer, unable to see at his angle, and gasped when he saw it. 

Someone had artfully arranged the lower intestine into the shape of the alpha symbol.


	3. Chapter 3

Stiles went back inside while Derek got rid of the body. Seeing it was one thing, but touching it? Dragging it across the porch for more _stuff_ to fall out as it moved? At least he didn’t dream anymore, that’s all Stiles could say, because he’d have had nightmares for years after seeing that. 

Had Derek been dealing with this for a while? Challenges, or whatever they were, from the alpha pack? No wonder he looked stressed. Stiles was surprised he was even sleeping with that sort of thing weighing heavy on his mind. It didn’t matter if he was part animal. That much death had to affect any human negatively. 

What stuck out most was the fact that it was a dead animal. To challenge someone in werewolf land one apparently killed something and put it on their front porch. And well, Stiles was dead. He didn’t know _why_ he was dead or why he came back. It scared him. Was he some sort of challenge too? From whatever, or whoever, killed him? 

Derek came back through the door and Stiles ignored him. There was no dead animal if there was no evidence, right? Like how if a tree falls in the woods and no one's there to hear it, there isn't a sound. And Stiles wanted to pretend there was no _anything_ on Derek’s body from it so there was effectively, no dead animal. He heard the shower turn on above him and relaxed, picking up his laptop to do some more research. 

Derek came down later, freshly showered and in a new pair of clothes, and Stiles had just finished an article on puppies from his self-medicated palate cleanser for the dead deer. 

“It wasn’t there when you and Jackson got here, right?” Stiles asked when Derek sat down and picked his book up again. 

Derek frowned, playing with the fold on a dog-eared page. “No. It wasn’t.”

It wasn’t the answer Stiles wanted, and it definitely wasn’t what Derek wanted. If it wasn’t there before, that meant it was placed there somewhere between when Isaac and Derek got back. And Derek didn’t sense it at all. Whoever did it could mask their scent, their footsteps, and the sound of their heartbeat, among other things. They were far more powerful than Derek’s abilities, that was for sure, and that was frightening. Scott was Scott, but Derek had years on him to develop control and strength, and if Derek was no match against these alphas? The resident werewolves of Beacon Hills were _so_ done. 

“What’s going to happen next?” he found himself asking. Stiles didn’t want the answer to that question, not really. He knew it wasn’t one he wanted. 

Derek swallowed, unable to look Stiles in the eyes. “I respond to the challenge.”

“And if you don’t?” 

“They continue and then…” Derek gestured at Stiles, unable to say the words, but Stiles understood it. He pointed at Stiles because Stiles was _dead_. Like the deer. If Derek didn’t respond to the challenge he would end up just like the deer. 

“How will you win?” _when your abilities are nothing compared to theirs?_

Derek didn’t answer, and Stiles knew what that meant. Derek didn’t think he could win. Not with two pack members. Not when they were stronger, faster, and smarter. Hell, he didn’t even know where they were. 

* * *

The next day Stiles was alone in the house again. Peter never came back, but either Derek was too preoccupied with the alpha pack problem, or it was a regular occurrence, because he didn’t say anything about it. So when he heard someone shifting around outside, slowly opening the door, he automatically assumed it was Peter. 

Stiles turned to the door, dropping Derek’s war book that had been in his hand into his lap, ready to fish for information because Peter was far more willing to share, and maybe to beg for Peter to go charge up his laptop because the Hale House had no working outlets and his laptop was dead. He nearly dropped his jaw instead when two girls he’d never seen in his life came in instead.

They looked enough like each other that Stiles thought they were sisters, if not fraternal twins. They had the golden tan sort of skin seen on middle eastern men and women, dark hair, and the same stocky body shape. He couldn’t see their faces well enough to guess on that front, but that was probably a good thing as far as he was concerned. 

Thankfully they were too busy doing _whatever_ they were doing to notice Stiles yet, so he was able to lie down carefully onto the couch. Peter said he looked dead when he did that, and that was what he was banking on. If it wasn’t just a group of teenagers on a dare or skipping school to get a little extracurricular smoking in, if they were werewolves, he was hoping everything Derek and Peter had said about him was true. Stiles did not want to be taken by anyone who could rip apart a deer like The Alpha Pack did. 

From his spot on the couch he couldn’t see what the girls were doing, but he could hear them. As far as he could tell, no one came in after they did so it was just the two, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t anyone else outside waiting on them. 

“Geez, the guy’s got no food in here,” one of them said and there were some clinking noises that followed. Stiles assumed they were in the kitchen. Or rather what was left of the kitchen because it was only some charred cabinets, a counter, and a table with a few boxes for stools.

“What the hell is he feeding his pack? Bunny rabbits?” 

They were definitely werewolves then, or humans in a werewolf pack but Stiles thought that was pretty unlikely. There was only one other pack in town as far as Stiles knew, The Alpha Pack, and he didn’t think they’d allow anyone other than alpha werewolves into it. Stiles was pretty sure he was a rare case as a human in a pack, but then again Scott himself was pretty strange in general. If there was an exception anywhere, Scott probably found it. 

“Nah, look at the trash. Takeout wrappers.” She sounded incredulous when she said it, and all Stiles could think of was his dad. They only ate takeout, with the occasional tv dinner, and if anyone went snooping in his house that’s all they’d find too. Family didn’t mean cooking for one another. It just meant eating together, even if it wasn’t the best for everyone health-wise. 

“I don’t know what Lacy wants us to find. This place is a dump. Not like Derek can stand a chance with such a small pack and bad living conditions.”

Lacy? Stiles stored that bit of information in his mind as best as he could. Whoever it was, probably a girl judging by the name, they had authority over the two girls. Did alpha packs have an actual alpha? Like a leader? With the way Scott and Derek were, Stiles didn’t see how alphas could stand listening to each other. But Scott and Derek were two sides of a coin. Scott cared about people involved and Derek would do anything to protect himself and his pack, even if it meant killing. 

“I’ve heard his pack’s smaller than we thought. Some of the little ones running around don’t respond to him.”

“Geez, he was just asking for us to come and beat him up, huh?” The girls laughed then and he could hear them walking around. Stiles hoped that the increasing loudness of their steps was just them feeling particularly stomp-y, not that they were getting closer to him.

“Where should we leave our message?” 

“Ugh, I dunno. I wanted to burn the house down all the way but Lacy said that was too much of a message. I thought it was poetic though, if you think about it. ‘We’re just like the Argents, your destruction if you don’t follow our rules.’ “

Thank God for Lacy, then. Stiles would rather not watch his skin melt off his bones, ‘cause chances were he’d be completely aware during the whole thing. 

Their footsteps sounded louder and louder, and Stiles knew without a doubt they were getting closer to the couch. He shot a panicked look at his laptop at his feet and shifted his body to make the quilt at his hips cover it more than it was. What if they found him? What if they didn't believe he was dead? 

Step-step. There was a freaking _laptop_ at his feet so if they put two and two together, aka they realized that there was a maybe dead person that probably shouldn't have been there, he was done for. He didn't want to be like that Deer, left for dead on the couch with his guts spilling out of his body. No way.

Just a few more steps and—

“Oh, look what we’ve got here.”

Shit.

A girl’s face appeared above him, soft features framed by short, wild black curls and piercing red eyes. The other girl entered his frame of view shortly after, and Stiles tried not to let his eyes move to look at her. She had the same face but with longer dark hair pulled back into a ponytail. Her eyes were brown, however, and there was a long scar that followed the path from her left eyebrow to the edge of the left corner of her mouth. And Stiles found that he was wrong earlier; these girls were identical twins. 

“Oh, well what do you know? It’s the dead kid everyone’s been up in a tizzy about.”

Short hair smirked. “You think Derek’s into necrophilia? This thing has been preserved with so much care.” They laughed after that, heads thrown back and mouths open wide. 

“Can’t see why else he’d steal a dead body from the morgue. Though if it is that, he’s into pedophilia as well because this kid doesn’t look a day over fifteen.” 

If Stiles wasn’t so scared shitless about being found undead alive, he would have made an indignant noise at that. He was turning seventeen in a few weeks, even if his body wasn't going to age anymore. 

“You think we should leave the message with him?” 

“Carve him up like a turkey?” 

“You bet.” 

They grinned and Stiles nearly shit himself. Well, he would have if he had anything in his body to release. He did not want to end up like that Deer, innards spilled out for the sole purpose of being a warning, a message. 

Scarface yanked up his shirt and he tried to be as stiff as possible because rigor mortis had a distinctive feeling and when Stiles moved it definitely did not feel like rigor mortis had set in to other people. Shorthair pulled out a knife and handed it to Scarface before pulling out another, a switchblade this time. 

The blade was cold and he could feel his skin loosen and pull away from his bones, but other than that he felt no pain. He didn’t even feel juices slide over his skin, but then again he probably had a very small amount of that, considering that everything sort of runs out before the decaying starts. 

“Ugh, I forgot how difficult skin is to work with.” 

“Dead skin, you mean. When they’re alive the blood makes things a little easier since it clots.”

“Whatever. You done yet?” 

“Yeah.”

The girls pulled their knives away and eyed Stiles’ stomach thoroughly. Stiles was careful not to move, and he found that it was easier to stay still when dead. Apparently his constant need to move was easily conquered by the stiffness in his muscles and the heaviness of his bones. 

They ran their eyes appreciatively over their handy work and the short haired one made a small noise. 

“Time’s up?” Scarface asked and Shorthair nodded her head. 

“Yeah. Message’s done. Let’s blow this popsicle stand.” 

Stiles counted to five hundred before he moved, half in an attempt to make sure the girls were long gone, and half trying to gather his bravery to look at his mauled stomach. Though he couldn't feel anything hanging out, the picture of that deer was plastered in front of his eyes no matter how many times he blinked to get it away.

He found a small mirror in one of the bins in the bathroom, but he wasn’t able to read what they drew into his skin. It was falling everywhere too easily with no blood to clot and hold it in place. At least there was nothing poking through; Stiles was able to force away the image of the deer when he saw that.

The stitching supplies were slightly harder to find than the mirror, but Stiles did find them. Actually doing the stitching was more difficult than Stiles thought, however. Trying to figure out which way your tattered skin was meant to fold wasn’t something Stiles ever wanted to do, only now he had to. His hands were shaky and held at an odd angle so he could see the shapes in his skin as he weaved them back together.

When he was done he closed his eyes and picked up the hand mirror again. The stitches weren’t quite as nicely done as Derek’s were on his knuckles, but they did what they were supposed to. His fingers traced the rough edges of the stitches and his stomach dropped. Stiles could read the words now too. 

“One month,” he murmured to his reflection. Derek only had one month before they came after him, made him like Stiles and like the deer on the porch. 

* * *

Stiles was on the couch reading one of the poetry books when Derek came home. Isaac was doing whatever Isaac did on Saturdays and Peter still hadn’t come back. Stiles got the feeling that Derek was at home alone a lot of the time. 

As soon as the door opened Derek took a curious look around and sniffed at the air. “Who’s been here?” he asked and Stiles was surprised he was able to smell the girls, since whoever planted the deer had completely masked theirs. 

Stiles swallowed, unable to find the words to answer. His fingertips touched his stomach through his t-shirt, tracing the letter “m” carved there. 

“Stiles! Who was here?” Derek was sounding increasingly angrier with every word he spoke. 

Stiles pressed into his stomach harder, still unable to answer. Derek only had one month. He had two pack members that only half listened to him and one month before he was forced to face those girls, Lacy, and whoever else was part of the alpha pack. 

“Was there another present on the porch?” Stiles found himself asking. 

Derek sighed, frustrated, and sat in the chair across from Stiles. 

“No. Is that what this is about Stiles? Another dead animal?” 

Stiles almost laughed at his word choice. Yeah, sure. _Another_. Only this one had been dead for days now, even if he could still talk and move. 

“Yeah," he began, his voice stumbling over the word. "Me.” 

He stood up slowly, hand pressed to his stomach as if the hard pressure could erase the stitches and words cut into his stomach, never to heal. He had a permanent tattoo he couldn’t erase. Derek had a look on his face that Stiles was beginning to equate with his alpha confusion face. The air felt still around him, stifling and suffocating even if he didn’t need to breathe it, and he inched the edge of his shirt up with every rise and fall of Derek’s chest. 

“One month,” Derek said into his palms, his hands cradling his face. It wasn’t a whole lot of time, especially for what Derek was working with. 

“Who was it?” he asked after a beat. 

Stiles lowered his shirt and collapsed on the couch. “Who do you think?” 

Derek knew who it was, knew as soon as he read the two words on Stiles’ stomach. The alphas were coming and there was no way Derek could stop them. 

“Do they know about you?” 

Stiles shook his head. They made comments about Stiles’ body only being there for some good ol’ fashioned dead teenaged boy loving, but Stiles would be surprised if they actually thought that was why Stiles was there. He would bet money that they didn’t know he was among the undead, but he didn’t know what exactly they would report. There wasn’t a reason for Derek to have Stiles’ body on his couch. 

“You were dead so they carved you up,” Derek mumbled, staring at Stiles’ stomach as if he could see the words through his t-shirt. 

“You’re alive and they plan to do the same thing to you,” Stiles retorted. He placed his palm on his stomach, feeling oddly naked with Derek staring there so hard. 

Derek looked up into Stiles’ eyes, suddenly very serious. “Not if I have a pack.” 

The “what pack?” hung heavy on Stiles’ tongue but he didn’t say it. He opened the poetry book back up and let the words choke him with their weight instead. 

They sat in silence reading their respective books until Isaac came back with Scott in tow.

Derek opened his mouth to say something, but Isaac beat him to it. “ _They_ left something for him too.” Derek shut his mouth and Stiles gaped. 

If the alphas challenged Scott, left a dead animal by his house, they clearly didn’t see him as a part of Derek’s pack. They saw him as an alpha in need of reform, or whatever it was they checked for. Did that mean he only had one month too?

Derek dragged Isaac over to kitchen. Stiles considered sneaking over to eavesdrop because unless he made a lot of noise heading over, it wasn’t like they could really sense him that close, but Scott gave him a sheepish smile and scratched at his neck. 

He was Stiles’ best friend and they hadn’t seen each other in days, not since that angry dispute and even longer since Stiles was alive. Seeing the smile usually reserved for when he did something stupid made his gut ache under the words. They were best friends. They were supposed to make time for each other, but Stiles was dead and Scott was ashamed because he blamed himself for it. And Stiles knew, no matter what, that it wasn’t Scott’s fault. 

Stiles shot a tentative grin back, trying to convey all his feelings on the matter. ‘ _I forgive you_ ’ was spoken loudest of all. 

Scott broke out in a grin then, stepping closer to Stiles now that he knew he could, and held out his hand to start their usual bro handshake. It didn’t matter if Scott accurately interpreted his grin, didn’t matter at all, because they were together again. And hey, maybe Scott was right last time. Maybe if Stiles did enough good deeds while he was dead he could be brought back to life and he wouldn’t need to see Scott watch him die. For now, they were bros and that was all that mattered. 

Scott grabbed his shoulders and looked very seriously into Stiles eyes. “I have a very important question for you.” 

Stiles’ lip quirked and he refrained from slipping his fingers under Scott’s armpits for an impromptu tickle fit. Scott thinking too hard was never a good thing as far as Stiles was concerned. That was why he had Stiles for a friend. Scott was the heart and brawn, and Stiles was the quick witted sarcasm and dashing good looks of the operation. 

“Do you, uh, have the urge to eat brains or anything?” 

Geez, Scott thought he was a zombie, which was actually a pretty accurate description if Stiles thought about it. Only he wasn’t decaying and didn’t have inside parts outside his body. 

“Even if I did I’m pretty sure you’d be safe.”

Scott squinted and gave Stiles a look that makes Stiles question why they were even friends. When his right hand moved from Stiles’ shoulder and formed a fist, Stiles knew he was in for it. And hell, Scott still didn’t know his strength when he play-punches, not that Stiles was able to feel it anymore. 

“Hey, wait, stop! I have delicate skin and I bruise easily and I can’t actually heal right now. I don’t want to live my afterlife black and blue, Scott. I’ve always found my best color to be more of a peach-y flesh, to be honest.”

Scott didn’t stop but his punches turned more into light taps, and Stiles decided that he held off on his tickle impulse too long and jammed his fingers into Scott’s sides, who squealed like a pig and dropped to the floor. Stiles fell on top of him, Scott having pulled him down while he fell, and adjusted his hips to pin Scott’s legs down. There was no way he could ever compete against a werewolves strength, but his tickling was distracting enough for Scott that he couldn’t properly get his strength into his movements. 

“Who is the tickle champ, who is it, Scott?” He cried out in his usual fashion, wiggling his fingers above Scott’s face while he caught his breath. Scott rolled his eyes and mock bit at the fingers just out of his reach before bucking Stiles off of him. Stiles fell over easily, throwing his shoulder over so he landed smoothly on his back, and they laid side by side next to each other, Scott panting hard enough for the both of them. 

A pair of legs came into Stiles’ peripherals and Stiles let his eyes run up the length of them until he was staring at Derek’s face, a single eyebrow raised in an incredulous look. Isaac was smirking hard next to Scott, arms crossed over his chest. 

“Do I want to know?” Derek asked, holding his hand out for Stiles to grab. 

Stiles shook his head no, grinning. “Probably not.” He grasped Derek’s hand lightly and let him pull Stiles up. Isaac did the same for Scott before they both made their way to the couch.

“So, Scott, I hear you’ve got information for us?” Derek said, dropping Stiles’ hand and moving to one of the open chairs. Stiles followed him, sitting in the only open seat left, a chair next to Derek and across from the couch he had taken residence on the last few days. 

Scott nodded his head, fidgeting with his shirt. “Yeah, um. About the Alpha Pack. Allison said her dad has surveillance on them but he’s not going to interfere with any werewolf business. Not unless a human gets stuck in the middle.” 

“So the Argents are staying out of this. I assume the same for the other hunters?” 

Scott shrugged. “I dunno. I mean, I guess so?” 

Derek sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “So what did you come here for? Except to give us information we were already aware of, I mean.” 

Scott glanced at Stiles for a second, frowning, then turned to look at his lap. 

Isaac reached out to pat Scott on the shoulder, a comforting move, and glared at Derek. Stiles was be lying if he wasn’t jealous. He apparently caused all the hurt in Scott while Scott’s new best friend got the job of comforting him. 

“What about the dead animal, Scott?” Stiles asked, desperate to keep the information flowing. It was a bad day for Stiles when everyone knew more than he did, as far as he was concerned. 

Scott blushed and looked off to the side, scratching at his neck. “Um, there wasn’t actually an animal. I just wanted to talk to you.” 

“But you could have done that without lying. I mean, I’m just right here.” 

He shook his head no, giving Stiles almost a pitying look, like he knew something Stiles didn’t. “Stiles, it’s been days since we’ve bro’d out or just been us. You don’t have your phone, you aren’t at school, and I have to use my mom’s car when she doesn’t have it to get here. Since you’ve… _y’know_ , I can’t reach you unless I have a reason to.” 

“Oh,” Stiles said, unable to form any other words. In a way, it was like he was long gone and dead-dead to Scott, even if by accident. He almost suggested living, er staying, with Scott because it wasn’t like Stiles really wanted to stay with Derek, but that wouldn’t work. Stiles didn’t take up much space but it was probably too much for Melissa McCall. They lived in a residential area and the risks for someone who was supposed to be dead being seen would’ve been higher. “I’ve got my laptop. Maybe we can set up some skype dates or hang in the woods or something.” 

No matter that Stiles’ laptop was currently dead and Derek had nowhere to charge it. He truly was disconnected from everyone when he had no technology and couldn’t be seen outside. He might as well have been living in the afterlife as far as anyone was concerned. 

Scott didn’t look any happier at Stiles’ suggestions, and Stiles so badly wanted for Scott to smile again, like he was earlier after they forgave each other.

“Or!” Stiles started, “Or, you could come here and hangout. Derek’s somehow got wifi, but I think that’s more of Peter’s doing and we can—“

“No,” Derek interrupted and Stiles nearly bit his lip in surprise. _No?_ Stiles definitely wasn’t expecting that. Sure, it was Derek’s place and he had the final word, but _no?_ It was empty most of the day, everyday, from what Stiles had experienced and it wasn’t like he and Scott could get into huge amounts of trouble when there was literally nothing but woods around. 

Stiles glanced at Scott, gaping, but judging by the bitter smile on his face and the utter lack of surprise, Scott expected the rejection. 

“What? Why not?”

Derek rolled his shoulders back, the picture of relaxed, like he was well aware that he was destroying the little hope Stiles had in anything lately and didn’t care. “He’s not pack,” he answered simply, and it was such a stupid answer. 

“ _I’m_ not pack!” Stiles argued. 

“You’re human.” 

Like that answered anything. So he was human? Scott still considered him a part of his pack. Why wasn’t Derek throwing a temper tantrum over that if he was so concerned about keeping the Hale House “pack only?” Stiles was tired of being left out of everything because he was only human. Now he was a freaking _dead_ human and it was still an issue. 

Scott didn’t say anything about it like Stiles wanted him to. Anything would’ve been nice, like “Stiles is my pack” or “Stiles is more than just a human,” but he didn’t open his mouth at all. Scott wasn’t scared enough of Derek to be worried about saying the wrong thing in his territory, so his silence didn’t make sense. Did Scott want to forget about Stiles that bad? Or worse, did Scott agree? Being human never made a difference between them, except maybe when Scott was trying to kill Stiles, but did it matter now? Screw Scott. 

Then Scott actually did open his mouth, but it wasn’t at all what Stiles wanted. “Mom needs me to get the car back.”

He stood and Isaac followed him up, fist bumping a goodbye. Stiles stood up belatedly, and even though he realized that Scott’s visit was entirely for him, he still felt a little left out. Isaac was slowly replacing him as a friend, especially now that Stiles was dead, and he was worse off in the supernatural area than he was before he died. 

Scott shot Stiles a mock salute and grinned. “See yah later dude, whenever the next reason comes.” 

“And our Skype date!” 

“Yeah, that too man.”

Stiles pulled him into a hug and squeezed tightly. He had to ignore the thump-thump of Scott’s heartbeat, couldn’t bare the reminder that he didn’t have that same response, but he missed this, whatever this was. “I might have another reason for you to come over soon,” he whispered, but he knew it was useless to do so in a room with werewolves. He might as well have shouted it.

Stiles felt Scott grin against his neck, and he was happy for it. Even if Stiles was dead, even if he wasn’t pack, he’d try and make this work. 

Scott pulled away with a crushing squeeze, and Stiles stood there waiting until he heard the car start up and pull out of the driveway. 

Stiles felt a strong, warm hand grasp his shoulder and he didn’t have to look to know it was Derek. It didn’t comfort him though, not at all, if that was what it was supposed to do. He was under the impression that it was Derek’s form of an apology and Stiles wasn’t going to accept it considering it was completely within Derek’s control.

“Why won’t you let Scott come over?” he asked, turning slowly around. 

Derek removed his hand and shrugged. “He’s not pack. He can’t be here unless he’s pack.” 

“I still fail to grasp why I’m allowed here then. I’m not pack either.”

“You’re human. You don’t count. And as long as he thinks you’re pack here…” Derek trails off, unable to look Stiles in the eyes. And that’s when Stiles gets it, gets why Derek has no issues with him staying there.

“Oh, so you’re going to bribe him into joining your pack with _me_? Good going, Derek, you’re such a fantastic alpha.” 

Stiles wasn’t allowed to see his best friend without reason because he and Derek were in some stupid pissing fit. He knew Derek needed a bigger pack to deal with the new alpha problem (the words “one month” burned tight on his stomach at the memory) but this was just ridiculous.

Derek didn’t answer and Stiles could’nt bring himself to care. There’s some anger there, building up in his core, but he couldn't seem to latch onto it and nurture it against Derek. He was tired, he realized, and he wished more than anything that he could hear his heartbeat where there was now only silence. He would give up so many things if he could just hear that steady thump-thump again.

Isaac had left the living room area by the time Stiles walked in, slumping into the couch with his arms crossed. Derek followed him in and sat gingerly next to him, like he was afraid Stiles would startle and attack him if he moved too fast or strongly.

“You wanna tell me what that reason is?” he asked, rubbing his palms against his jean-covered thighs. At first Stiles thought he was asking about why Derek was such a bad alpha, but he was far too prideful to ask that and Stiles didn’t _really_ think Derek was bad. It wasn’t like Stiles had much experience on that front anyway; Scott had always taken the leader position, even if he was no better a leader than Stiles. 

“For Scott to come over?” Stiles asked, and he’s too numb to care that his voice sounds strange at that soft decibel in his new dead voice.

Derek nodded his head sharply, staring at something across the room with an intensity that rivaled Scott’s towards Allison. 

Stiles bit his lip, careful not to break the skin or pull at the dry parts because it had only really just hit him that it would never go back. The stitches in his skin were a reminder of that. 

“I’ve been thinking about The Alpha Pack, and how they were able to plant that deer without you noticing,” he said and Derek turned enough to look at Stiles out of the corner of his eye. “And no offense, but you really don’t stand a chance if they can mask their heartbeat and their scent from you. Hell, they could be here right now and we wouldn’t know it.” 

“I knew they were here this afternoon,” Derek insisted. 

“Yeah but, we don’t know if they did that on purpose or if there’s only one—the leader—who can do that. We need to get a leg up on them but there’s no way we can do that if they’re more powerful. We can’t mask our scent and heartbeat—“

“No,” Derek interrupted, back stiff. Stiles knew he’d figured it out, what Stiles was trying to say, but he didn’t think Derek would react like that. He thought Derek would be grateful that Stiles was willing to suggest what he was suggesting, even if Stiles had his own set of reasons for it.

“But you didn’t let me finish! You guys can’t mask your scent and heartbeat but I can.”

“Stiles.” It was a warning, but Stiles heard his voice lift at the end and knew Derek wasn’t solid on it. 

“I don’t have either of those things. I could spy on them and they wouldn’t even know it, leave dead animals around without them sensing me.” 

“Stiles, the answer is still no.” 

“But why not? You’ll get obliterated without this. And you know what? I’ll do it if you let Scott come around more often and maybe trust me enough to share things that are pertinent to Scott’s and my survival.” 

“You’re willing to gamble away your life for _trust_. That isn’t how things work, Stiles, and besides, I don’t need this. There’s another way.” 

Stiles rolled his eyes, frustrated. “What? Roll onto your back and beg them to let you join their little pack? Spare you and your pack in exchange for obedience?” 

“No. If I get Scott on my side, and Jackson, have my pack grow, I will be strong enough to get them out of Hale territory.” 

Stiles scoffed. Yeah. Jackson and Scott were so excited to join Derek’s pack they were waiting outside the front door, jumping up and down, practically foaming at the mouth, and maybe peeing themselves a little in excitement like puppies. 

But what came out of his mouth instead was, “If that’s what you want.” 

* * *

Stiles was situating himself on the couch, getting himself ready for a long night of ceiling watching and listening to Isaac breath when a strong hand grabbed his shirt and pulled him physically off the couch. He didn’t fall to the floor or anything, Derek’s hand kept him upright until he managed to untangle his feet from the quilt and stand on the floor, but it was disorienting all the same. 

Stiles rubbed at his neck where it should have been smarting and frowned at Derek. There really wasn’t a reason for that at all.

“You’re sleeping upstairs,” Derek offered as a means of explanation and turned around to head upstairs. Stiles was grateful he didn’t actually drag him upstairs by the shirt, but _what the hell?_

Isaac was up and on the couch Stiles had been laying on in a matter of seconds, apparently not as asleep as Stiles had thought. 

“Finally get to stretch out,” Isaac said smugly and Stiles suddenly felt bad for putting Isaac out of his bed when he didn’t even sleep. 

Where exactly was Stiles sleeping? On the couch upstairs in the room where he found out he was dead? Derek’s room? The bathroom? There wasn’t much else up there that didn’t have entire walls or ceilings missing. 

He walked up the stairs slowly, wincing every time the old wood squeaked under his footsteps even though quietness wasn’t a needed thing. On the steps Stiles could barely make out hushed voices from one of the rooms, and he assumed it was coming from Derek’s. It was the only one besides the bathroom that had an actual door, and he was standing close enough to the bathroom to know that the door was wide open. 

“Peter! Peter, no,” he heard, and his curiosity was peaked. What was making Derek sound so desperate like that? 

“Why would you do that to him?” he said and Stiles froze, hand just in front of the door knob. Do _what_ to _whom?_ Stiles decided announcing his presence right that moment could wait, his curiosity was piqued. 

“No. Fine. I’m hanging up now.” 

There was a clicking sound that Stiles assumed was Derek shutting his flip phone, and some shuffling noises, probably from Derek moving around. Stiles took a step away from the door, suddenly nervous. 

What if that phone call was about him? 

The door opened and Stiles nearly fell on his butt in surprise, barely catching himself on the doorframe before his legs totally gave out. 

“Oh, hey, Derek,” Stiles said, a nervous lilt to his voice. “Didn’t expect you to open the door right then.” 

Derek rolled his eyes and grabbed his shoulder, roughly pulling Stiles into the room. 

“Wow, okay. Thanks for inviting me in, Derek.” 

“You’re welcome, Stiles,” Derek said absentmindedly, as if he really believed Stiles was thankful because he wasn’t listening well enough to catch the sarcasm. He sat down on the edge of the bed and kicked off his shoes. When Derek’s fingers grazed the edge of his t-shirt and started pulling up, Stiles nearly choked on the still air in his throat.

“Wait,” Stiles said, his voice strangled. “What are you doing?” 

Derek’s neck flushed, and it was the most adorable thing Stiles had seen Derek do since he discovered that he kept family pictures on his person and left the bed unmade when he woke up. “Getting ready for bed? What else would I be doing?” 

Stripping? Getting your alpha mojo on with a little shirtless bed rolling? Singing T-Swift into a hairbrush while dancing around? 

“Wait. Am I sleeping here? In your bed?” 

Derek made his little constipated confusion face and said, “Yeah? Isn’t that what I said downstairs?” 

No, that wasn’t what he said. Sleeping, if what Stiles did could be considered that, could be done in more than one place described as “upstairs.”

“No, but why?”

Derek shrugged and shed his jeans. If Stiles were still alive he would’ve died at the sight of Derek in briefs. “Isaac said you’re still getting up so I need to keep a watch on it.”

“By _sleeping_ with me?” 

Derek turned to slide under the sheets, but Stiles could see a little red on his neck. 

“Well you don’t have to make it weird,” he grumbled. 

Stiles mouth felt thick and hot. If he were still alive, he’d be panicking right now. Or completely thrilled. One or the other. Getting into bed with a good looking guy in briefs had been a particular fantasy he’d visited more than once, but definitely not with Derek Hale. Dark, broody werewolves were thrown on his no-list once bad things started happening around them. As it was, he wasn't even the littlest bit turned on when he definitely should have been, and hell, even if it was embarrassing Stiles would kill for a semi then. Anything that would tell him he was alive. “Yeah, werewolves need their beauty sleep,” he said softly and shuffled to the other side of the bed.

Stiles pulled off his shoes but didn’t take anything else off before sliding underneath the covers. It really wasn’t worth it when you were dead, he decided. 

There was a foot or more between Stiles and the triskele tattoo on Derek’s back, his shoulders tense and spine curved inwards on itself. The heat curled off of him and Stiles felt like he could see each tendril reach out and tease him with their warmth, whispering that Derek was still alive in his ears.

Stiles imagined that tears were prickling the back of his eyes because his body didn’t allow that anymore. He wouldn’t mind crying in front of Derek though, or his back at least, as long as it meant he was still alive. 

The warmth teased him again and Stiles wanted to lay his hand against Derek’s back and soak up that heat until his body temperature was close enough to normal that he could pretend for a little while. 

“Stop moving,” Derek said and his voice sounded so tight, tense like his shoulders. 

He hadn’t realized he’d been shifting around. There was maybe six inches between him and the planes of Derek’s back.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, “ ‘m not comfortable.”

“You’re dead, being comfortable doesn’t matter.” 

Stiles nearly froze. It was the first time Derek had explicitly said he was dead. It hurt to choke out a reply. 

“Don’t be such a…such a necroist,” he managed to get out and he watched with relief to see the lines of Derek’s shoulders relax a little. 

“That’s not even a word.” 

“You’re not even a word.” 

There was a noise then, but it was cut off in Derek’s throat before it had time to fully form. Stiles would say it was close to a laugh, but Derek didn’t laugh. His body was at least thirty percent brood, fifty-nine percent evil, and ten percent children’s tears from what Stiles had seen. There wasn’t enough happiness left in that final percent for a laugh to ever think of forming.

“Go to sleep, Stiles,” Derek said after a moment of silence, and Stiles relaxed into the bed. Dead people didn’t sleep, but it was nice for Derek to treat him as human, as living, even if it wasn’t on purpose. 

“By the way we’re going to the Animal Clinic tomorrow,” Derek said, his voice clouded by sleep. “Deaton says he has some more information for you.”

 _You_. Not us, not we. You. Stiles’ death was his own business now. Everyone had other things to deal with.

Stiles nodded his head even though Derek couldn’t see it. His breaths had already evened out in his sleep and Stiles was alone again.


	4. Chapter 4

Stiles was sitting on the edge of the bed when he came to the next morning, the sound of Derek’s soft snoring tickling the back of Stiles’ consciousness. His eyes curiously traced the edges of the dirty borrowed sneakers on his feet as he listened to Derek’s breathing change. He was waking up. 

“Derek,” he said, directing his voice at the ceiling more than anything else. Stiles felt Derek jolt up behind him.

“Wha?” 

“I think…” Stiles said, voice thick with an emotion he couldn’t place. He kicked at the dirt piles under his feet. He wasn’t ready to admit there might have been something else up with him outside of the whole undead thing. “I think I got up last night.”

Derek took a moment to wake up before answering, and Stiles let him. “Why do you think so?”

Stiles pointed at his feet, the shoes around them. “I wasn’t wearing shoes when I got in the bed.” 

“Oh,” Derek said through a yawn. “Well do you remember anything?” 

He shook his head no and fell back onto the bed, narrowly missing Derek’s feet with his head. “Unh-unh. Did you hear anything last night?” 

Derek’s neck flushed but he didn’t say anything. Stiles was taking that as a no then. Awesome. 

“Let’s just…go to the Animal Clinic then.” 

“Yeah.”

Derek got up, grabbing a towel off the top of a plastic bin, and stumbled out the door, clearly not awake yet. Stiles waited until the shower turned on before he went downstairs.

* * *

It was a chilly morning from what Stiles could tell. Derek actually shivered and his breath formed its own personal fog in the cool air. It was stupid but it made him think of all the times he pretended to smoke with Scott outside when they were kids, picking up pieces of grass or sticks to be their “cigs.” 

He found himself forcing his teeth to clatter in the way little kids did when they tried to emulate the way cartoon characters acted when they were in freezing water. They weren’t cold and neither was he. No amount of rubbing or pinching would make the imaginary gooseflesh on his arms disappear. 

Stiles was surprised when Deaton was actually inside the Animal Clinic because it was really freaking early in the morning, but he wasn’t complaining. Standing around waiting for Deaton to get there with Derek wasn’t his idea of fun. Especially not when he wasn’t sure which Derek he would encounter, the one who made jokes or the one who tried to be his alpha and control him. He wasn’t sure which one made him more uncomfortable. Sure, the controlling Derek wasn’t a bucket of joy, but at least Stiles knew how to react to him when he was like that. It was usual, normal. And it was already hard enough thinking about how human Derek was; nothing like he and Scott had convinced themselves he was. 

“Stiles, go ahead and sit down on the table,” Deaton said with a smile and Stiles shuffled behind him, feeling awkward. 

The table wasn’t cold, not like Stiles expected it to be. But lately everything was doing the opposite of what he expected and it was throwing him off balance. 

“I was able to find something after consulting some old texts,” he said, dropping an old book on the table. Dust flew out everywhere and Stiles wrinkled his nose out of habit. “Ed Cutterly mentioned something about energy for those beyond the grave several times in his books, though it’s not apparent unless you read them in their original language, but I found something that will probably tell us how much energy you have.”

“Probably?” Stiles asked. 

“Surely,” Deaton said with a warm grin, and Stiles wished it reassured him like it used to whenever he and Scott came to him with Scott’s problems. Call him a coward if you wanted to, but Stiles didn’t want to know how much energy he had. He wasn’t ready to face his shelf life yet. 

“If we do this several days in a row I can get a reading of how much you’re losing each day and create an accurate picture of how long you’ve got left.” 

Stiles glanced over at Derek, needing some sort of input because holy hell, he wasn’t ready to die yet, but Derek was distracted, giving his ancient flip phone an odd look that Stiles would almost go as far as to classify as _concerned_. He wondered who was on the other end of the phone making Derek look like that.

* * *

Stiles wasn’t sure what Deaton was doing, but it looked and felt ridiculous. He rubbed dirt onto certain parts of Stiles’ body and touched some kind of bone looking thing to the dirty part of Stiles’ skin before setting it on the table and staring intensely at it. Then, Deaton either made a frustrated noise or his face settled into a grim line, both indicating to Stile that Deaton was not finding what he was looking for. Then the process started over again with a new kind of dirt that he pulled from a different jar. 

“Why does this call for so much freaking dirt?” Stiles asked, limbs twitching at having to stay still for so long.

Deaton pulled his eyes up from where he was watching his pile of bones. He stood up slowly, sighing. “Life starts and ends with it, along with everything inbetween. It is both neutral and biased. Earth is a grounding substance, something Cutterly has mentioned several times in his text. It is why Mountain Ash works so well against the supernatural.”

Stiles smirked and Deaton scooped up a greenish colored pile of dirt. “Does that mean I should carry around a jar of dirt?” 

“It didn’t work well enough for Jack Sparrow for me to suggest you try it.”

Stiles was so taken aback by the pop-culture reference that he couldn’t keep from choking out a second or two of laughter. It was a foreign idea, adults watching movies or Dr. Deaton doing anything but fix up animals and werewolf-oopsies. Almost as foreign as Derek making jokes.

“What?” Derek asked, apparently startled out of whatever he was doing with his phone by Stiles’ bark of laughter. Deaton grinned slyly and picked up his bones to poke and prod at Stiles’ dirty skin.

Stiles waved Derek off, taking care not to mess up whatever Deaton was doing. “Nothing of importance, Mr. Distracted. Carry on with the whole sulking at your phone thing you’ve been doing for the past hour.” 

Derek frowned. “It’s not like this is very interesting.” 

“Well, no one told you to stay. “

“I’ve got nothing better to do.” 

Stiles rolled his eyes and Derek turned back to his phone. Deaton looked up from his bones and grinned. 

“I have the results now,” he said and Stiles felt his stomach drop. 

He heard Derek moving behind him, standing up or just shifting his legs, Stiles didn’t know. 

“And?” Derek asked and Stiles swallowed. It wasn’t Derek’s business to ask. This wasn’t his trip to the doctor’s office. He was just the annoying neighbor reading magazines in the back because Stiles’ dad was working and he was too young to drive. 

Deaton shrugged, handing Stiles a towel to wipe all the dirt off his arms, and legs where his pants were rolled up. “He has energy.” 

“How much?”

Another shrug. “There isn’t a number I can give. Once I see how much it has decreased by tomorrow, I can give an estimate of how long he has left, however.” 

Stiles wondered what Derek would do if he threw a temper tantrum and refused to go next time. He didn’t want to know when he was going to die for good. Hell, even living people didn’t know how long they had left, at least not really. 

“Derek,” Stiles started, grabbing the sweatshirt he’d pulled off for Deaton’s experiment. “Just leave it, c’mon.” 

Derek grunted in reluctance, but followed Stiles out to the Camaro nonetheless. 

“No super secret talks today?” Stiles asked while he strapped himself into the Camaro out of habit. He sort of hoped that since he buckled up when he was dead and really didn’t need to, something would happen and he’d be normal and alive again. He would go on seat-belt wearing campaigns if it meant he’d be alive again, even though he hated talking to people. Well, people he didn’t deem cool enough to be graced with his presence. 

“Nope,” Derek said simply and peeled out of the Animal Clinic’s parking lot. Stiles didn’t push further.

* * *

Jackson was sitting on the steps to the house when Derek pulled in, kicking at the dirt under his feet with sharp, unpredictable thrusts and fiddling with phone in his hands. He was mad about something, that was for sure, and Stiles had no doubt about what, or whom, judging by the way his neck snapped up when the car pulled into the driveway. 

Derek sighed into the steering wheel, taking his time to cut the Camaro off. Apparently he put two and two together and figured out why Jackson was there too. But then again he’d have to be blind or Scott-on-Allison focused not to be able to read the situation right. 

Stiles wished he would hurry up so the whole confrontation could be done and over with as soon as possible, preferably before Stiles got anywhere near the Hale House entrance. But looking at Derek’s pace, Stiles would have to turtle crawl to get there after Derek and Jackson finished part two of their pissing contest. 

Derek stepped out of the car and Stiles watched him straighten his back, creating the imposing alpha frame. It looked funny on him now, since his shoulders had done nothing but slump over since the night before. He hadn’t even tried the big-bad-alpha look on Deaton that morning, and Stiles was beginning to think that Derek actually trusted Deaton, which was weird because from what Stiles had seen Deaton was pretty biased towards Scott. 

“Explain this,” Jackson said in a tight, controlled voice. His jaw clenched and unclenched at speeds faster than Stiles or Scott were ever able to make it, and he shoved his phone into Derek’s hands. 

Stiles peered over Derek’s shoulder to look at Jackson’s phone. He almost snorted at Derek’s clumsy fingers on the phone clearly years fancier than Derek’s simple flip-phone before he noticed what was shown on the screen. 

“Shit,” Stiles whispered, and Derek grunted in response. 

Jackson got a present from the Alphas too.

It was an opossum this time, but it was clearly left by The Alpha Pack. Everything that was wrong with the deer they’d left for Derek was wrong with the opossum, and Stiles didn’t want to think about the clean up. It was worse this time, knowing exactly how the Alphas did their carvings first hand. 

Stiles couldn’t help running his fingertips along the message they’d left on him through his shirt. Did Scott get a message like that? Shit. He needed to make sure, or get Derek to tell him where the alpha pack was because Stiles needed to keep his best friend safe. His human self didn’t allow much but at least he could spy on them without them noticing because of his scent or whatever. 

Derek shoved the phone back into Jackson’s hand like one would a dirty diaper they didn’t know what to do with and said, “This is why you need to join me.” 

Jackson let out an angry huff and slipped his phone into his pants pocket, clearly frustrated with Derek’s answer. Stiles had been dealing with Derek’s cryptic non-answers from the beginning, and Scott more than him, so he really didn’t have much sympathy for Jackson. 

“I think you need to tell me why there was a dead _whatever_ on the steps to my front door before I even consider doing that.” 

Derek snorted and Stiles wanted to roll his eyes. The whole problem could be solved if Derek would just tell Jackson that the Alpha Pack left it. Or, hey, he could have Stiles say it and it would be the complete truth but Jackson wouldn’t believe it because it came out of _his_ mouth. 

“If you join my pack you will be protected from it.”

“I can protect myself just fine, remember? I just need to know who left this, and even better, _why_. And Google isn’t much help at answering why there’s a dead animal on my steps.” 

Yeah, Stiles totally agreed with that last statement. He had tried that too, and he would probably never try it again. He was pretty sure a cat was not the source of their problems, no matter how much google tried to tell him it was. A big dog, maybe, but Derek wasn’t partial to dog jokes. 

“No,” Derek said firmly. “You need to join my pack and we will both be strong enough to protect ourselves. Right now you aren’t.” 

Right now Derek wasn’t either, but maybe only Stiles and Peter knew that. 

“Tell me that again, tough guy,” Jackson snarled, his claws lengthening as he spoke. 

Stiles took a step back, startled. Scott had had good control lately and it was weird seeing someone so out of control again. But Jackson wasn’t his best friend. If anything, talking would probably egg him on instead of act as a small voice of reason like it did Scott. 

“You aren’t strong enough to protect yourself, Jackson,” Derek said firmly and Jackson lunged at him. Derek easily side stepped him and grabbed a wrist with his very human hand as Jackson hurdled forward. “You can’t even keep yourself in control.” 

He dropped Jackson’s hand like it wasn’t worth his time, like _Jackson_ wasn’t worth his time, and watched Jackson pull himself up. His claws had retracted but his eyes were still firmly that eerie werewolf blue that Derek’s used to be. 

Stiles had edged himself more and more towards the house during their fight, annoyed with Derek and Jackson, and scared for Scott because all he could picture was a dead animal on his doorstep. Melissa McCall didn’t deserve that, and neither did Scott really. He had too much heart to deserve anything like that. 

He was nearly to the door when Derek turned his back on Jackson, done with the conversation and the fight. Done with Jackson. That was a big enough no-no in video games that Stiles would’ve called out Derek’s mistake before Jackson even thought to move, but his voice caught in his throat, and Jackson got a claw into Derek’s shoulder before he was able to fully react. 

In the time it took for Stiles to blink, Derek had twisted and thrown Jackson over his shoulder fully transformed. The shock of the hit made Jackson’s body rear up off the ground and into one of Derek’s claws. Derek was going all out. 

He wasn’t a very big fan of Jackson, but that didn’t mean he wanted bad things to happen to him. Well. That didn’t mean he wanted bad things to happen to him _all the time_ , because let’s be honest. Stiles had entertained the occasional thought of Jackson in pain and/or suffering. But he had a lifetime of good karma to build up in the hopes that he’d get to be alive again, and saving Jackson should get him at least a couple points of good will in that aspect.

Stiles’ body moved before he told it to, throwing itself into Derek to knock him at least somewhat off of Jackson’s body. He’s pretty sure that if he had time to think about it, he definitely would never have done that. Heroism wasn’t really his thing. More of Scott’s thing actually, which in a roundabout way got Stiles involved, but all in all Stiles would say he was pretty low on the heroic acts list. 

Especially when being the hero did nothing but get Stiles a clawed uppercut to the shoulder, and hell, he’d have to borrow another shirt from Isaac. 

The noise that escaped his mouth at impact wasn’t quite a gasp since he didn’t have any sort of breath to fuel it, but whatever it was made Derek go very still and jump back from Stiles, wide-eyed. He was human then, his hands nothing more than bloody man-fingers and callused palms, and his eyes their usual hazel. Control, Stiles reminded himself, Derek usually had it. 

“Ouch,” Stiles said breathlessly out of habit more than anything. He could tell by the way the t-shirt was pulling at his flesh that the skin from his right shoulder to mid breast-bone was torn, but there was no pain. 

“Wha?” Derek started, his brows pulling up in confusion. His eyes tracked the scene, resting on Stiles’ shoulder, his own hands, and a human Jackson lying dazed on the ground next to him with a panicked ease. 

“Um, you, uh, probably shouldn’t beat up people you want to be pack,” Stiles said, gesturing at Jackson. He wasn’t sure what to say. Stiles didn’t really expect to save Jackson, and it was clear that Derek didn’t either. 

“Yeah,” Derek said, swallowing. 

And Jackson was still just lying there. Stiles could see his wounds start to sluggishly knit up, but he wasn’t moving, not really. 

Derek turned his eyes where Stiles’ were and made an indiscernible noise. He uselessly wiped his hands against his pants and reached forward, holding a hand out to Jackson’s frame. 

Apparently, he wasn’t dead or dazed like Stiles thought because Jackson grabbed ahold of the hand and let Derek pull him up. He balanced himself precariously, off center for some reason and Stiles marked it off as being a symptom of when his head hit the ground. 

“I still won’t join your pack,” Jackson said and he walked stiffly back to his car. Stiles thought he might have seen his eyes flash, yellow and lizard-like, before his back was fully turned, but they couldn’t be. 

Derek was already inside by the time Stiles pulled his eyes away from the retreating shape of the Porsche.

* * *

Derek pounced as soon as Stiles stepped through the doorway, grabbing his arm firmly and dragging him upstairs.

“You’re an idiot,” Derek grumbled and shoved him through the bathroom door. 

Stiles stumbled a little but caught himself on one of the plastic bins. 

“I could say the same thing,” Stiles shouted. Derek had left the bathroom almost as soon as he had thrown Stiles in, but Stiles knew he could still hear him. When he heard the resounding thunk of Derek kicking one of the plastic bins in his bedroom, Stiles grinned. Yeah, Derek could still hear him.

Stiles had situated himself on the toilet with the tattered remains of Isaac’s shirt tossed over his legs when Derek came back with the fishing line and a new t-shirt in hand. 

“One of Isaac’s?” Stiles asked, gesturing at the fabric in his hands. 

“No, one of mine.” 

Well he guessed that answered any questions about Derek owning things that weren’t bloody, wife-beaters, or henleys. But there was still a sixty percent chance that he was giving the only shirt that he had that _wasn’t_ any of those things to Stiles, he reckoned. 

Derek crouched in front of Stiles and started pressing at the loose skin on his shoulder. Stiles grimaced out of habit. 

“You really are an idiot you know,” Derek said, pulling his hand off of Stiles and reaching for the fishing line and needle.

“I’m not the one who lost control.” 

“I was in complete control.” 

The needle sunk into Stiles’ flesh and Stiles could feel his shoulder heat up from the warmth of Derek’s breath flowing across it. 

“Yeah, sure,” Stiles started. “Tell that Jackson who you _want for a pack member_. I don’t know about you but physical pain has never been an incentive in me joining a group.” 

Derek’s jaw clenched and Stiles felt his skin pucker at a particularly hard pull of the fishing line. 

“I don’t see you leading a pack,” Derek grumbled.

He didn’t see Derek leading a pack either. Not when Peter was still missing in action and Isaac only came back for food and a place to sleep. 

“I could help you, y’know.” 

“Do what? Make friends? Because I hate to tell you this Stiles but Scott is your only friend and he’s not particularly hard to be friends with.” 

That wasn’t fair, Stiles had other friends. Sure, most of them were online and the ones that weren’t were probably more acquaintances or classmates in standing but it wasn’t because Stiles was bad at making friends. He just didn’t need anyone else but Scott. 

“Well, _you_ seem to have trouble getting on Scott’s good side.”

“I’m apparently the only exception to the rule then,” Derek said, cutting the string. His eyebrows were furrowed together and his breath was coming out faster, clearly frustrated. 

“Tell me where the Alphas are—“

“Stiles.”

“I know you know where they are. They would’ve left more than just _one month_ if you didn’t, so why won’t you—“

“Stiles, we aren’t doing this,” Derek said, standing up. He dropped his t-shirt over Isaac’s torn one on Stiles’ lap and walked towards the door, where he paused for a moment. “I don’t know why you’re so keen to gamble what life you have left, but you will lose this encounter if you try, Stiles.” 

With that he exited the bathroom and Stiles was left by himself, staring at the t-shirt in his arms and his patchwork Frankenstein’s Monster body.

“Just let me help,” he finished quietly. It didn’t matter if Derek could hear it or not. That wasn’t his concern, and if he was being honest, Derek probably did hear it. 

What did matter was that Derek wasn’t the only one getting “gifts” from the Alpha Pack and Stiles hadn’t felt this strong since before the kanima incident. He was still human, but he could help this time. There were things he could do that the werewolves couldn’t, and sure those talents weren’t really done on purpose but they were _his_ and his alone, and that was all that mattered.

He was worried about Scott, and he was stuck in some sort of Derek imposed house arrest when he could do something to save him. 

Except that the house arrest wasn’t really house arrest, Stiles realized. At least not really. There was nothing keeping Stiles at the Hale House but the lack of knowledge of the whereabouts of the Alpha Pack and fact that he could be seen by pretty much anyone and recognized as the kid who’s body went missing from the morgue. 

But the thing was, there was at least one other person who knew where the Alpha Pack was. Scott said the Argents had cameras on them, which meant they knew their location, and if the Argents knew that probably meant Allison did and when Allison knew so did Scott. 

Lydia might as well since she was Allison’s best friend, but Stiles didn’t think he could handle that. It was bad enough seeing her heartbroken over Jackson and then get back together with him, but to see her when he knows he has absolutely know chance in hell now that he’s dead? The thought itself made him feel pretty freaking miserable. 

Sneaking out was way easier than Stiles thought, but then again Derek may not have cared if he left. Well, he might have if Stiles had grabbed the Camaro keys on the way out, but after looking for Derek’s jacket where the keys where held and being unable to find it, Stiles figured it was probably on Derek’s body at that moment in time and getting the keys would be nearly impossible. Unless Derek was okay with underage boys and Stiles had somehow gotten magic seduction abilities in his death, but the chances of either of those happening were pretty slim as far as Stiles was concerned. So he ended up nixing that idea, even if he really wanted to drive the Camaro to Scott’s house.

* * *

Scott was lying on his bed, aimlessly tossing a lacrosse ball up into the air, when Stiles tumbled in through the window and nearly landed on top of him. The ball landed somewhere with a thunk before Scott was startled out of his shock enough to speak.

“Stiles…what?” 

Stiles pulled himself fully off the bed and walked over to Scott’s desk chair, where he promptly spun it around and sat looking at Scott with the back of the chair between his legs. 

“Hey,” Stiles said simply, grinning. 

Scott returned his smile and threw himself across his bed to grab the lacrosse ball off the floor where it landed without physically getting of the bed. He was still smiling when he pulled himself up and flopped over so he could hold a conversation with Stiles while still lying across his bed. 

“Dude, it is so weird not being able to sense you again. Like no heartbeats or anything. It makes me feel like a human again but weirder because I can still hear my mom’s heartbeat downstairs if I listen closely enough.” 

Stiles’ grin dropped ever so slightly. “Yeah, well,” he said without going anywhere in particular with his words. How the hell was he supposed to bring up the Alpha Pack without cluing Scott in? Scott would probably say no to his plan as well, or hell, suggest he do it instead of Stiles. 

“I think she had sex last night too because when she came home from what I _thought_ was work she just smelled so…ew. I don’t want to think about my mom having sex, Stiles!” Scott burrowed his head in his hands, adjusting the ball in his hands to keep from crushing his eye with it. 

Stiles snorted. “Well buddy, at least she didn’t do it here.” 

“No, don’t even say that,” Scott wailed. “I can’t deal with that.” 

It was quiet for a bit while Stiles collected his thoughts and Scott tried to worm his way out of his. 

“So how’s it been in the land of the living?” Stiles finally asked. 

Scott pulled his face out of his hands and gave Stiles a tired smile he didn’t know how to read. 

“Well, me and Allison just split again—“

“Sorry, dude.”

“—the police still don’t have any leads on your body, y’know _obviously_ , Harris is still a butthole but I’ve managed to keep a B average so far even with all this weird werewolf stuff lately, and, well, your funeral was last night.”

Scott got quiet and started fiddling with the lacrosse ball in his hands. Stiles couldn’t force any words out. Any sentences he managed to string together became a jumbled mess of weight and reluctance when they hit his throat. 

“It was closed casket since your body’s missing and all, and it was so weird. The ground isn’t frozen yet so they’re going to bury an empty casket because no one knows why the body’s gone. And…and the whole time I couldn’t keep from thinking that your body was really in that casket because it just doesn’t feel like you’re really you and I can’t handle thinking that my best friend is dead and you at the same time. I’m sad and it hurts but I just can’t see you as you.” 

Scott got quiet and buried his face in his hands again.

“I’m still me,” Stiles said quietly, kicking at the floor. 

Scott pulled his face from his hands and grinned weakly at Stiles, who couldn’t muster up enough strength to return it. 

“Yeah, no. I’m sorry, Stiles. It’s just--It’s just been hard on me lately. Let’s talk about something else.” 

“So…werewolf problems?” 

Scott sighed in relief and started tossing the ball into the air again.

“Like you wouldn’t believe dude. As soon as you…left, a freaking kanima showed up. With _wings_. Me and Allison checked Jackson, but dude he’s just a werewolf.”

Stiles quirked his lip. Yeah he found that out first hand earlier that day. 

“Me and Deaton narrowed some stuff down after work one day but like, Ms. Morrell, the guidance counselor, she stole the notes and disappeared. I didn’t even know she knew about this stuff but apparently she does. And she’s _evil_. Like bad evil. It’s exhausting.” 

What? _Seriously?_ Stiles didn’t expect that. Yeah she seemed a little all knowing, but only in a counselor creepy sort of way. But a kanima? And right after Stiles died? Did that have anything to do with his death? 

“I bet it is.” 

It quiet again and Scott stared at him with desperation in his eyes, telling Stiles that the conversation was all on him. But Stiles didn’t know what to say, not really.

“Did you, uh, know that someone left a dead animal on Derek’s front porch the other day? Jackson too.” 

Scott let out a huff, like he didn’t know if he should laugh or be scared. But to be honest, picturing either one of them, especially Jackson, having to deal with a dead animal was a pretty funny sight. It had Stiles freaked and worried because he knew who was behind it, but to Scott who maybe didn’t, yeah it was a pretty funny image outside of the whole dead animal thing. 

“What? Seriously? _Why_?” 

Stiles nearly melted, the relief hit him so hard. So Scott hadn’t gotten a challenge yet, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t next. The stitches keeping the Alpha Pack’s message closed felt like they were burning on his stomach, but he knew they couldn’t be. Dead people weren’t supposed to feel anything like pain. 

“Some kind of present or whatever from the Alpha Pack. Jackson came over this morning and tried to rip one into Derek. He was practically shitting himself, he was so scared about it.” 

“Jeez, that’s so weird.” 

“Yeah, you got that right. And Derek’s freaking out because he can’t find out where the Alpha Pack is.” 

Stiles rolled his eyes to drive the point home, grateful that his lack of heartbeat would keep Scott from knowing he was lying. He’d gotten good enough at erasing his tells lately from having to lie to his dad so often. 

Scott laughed, like Stiles knew he would. Derek’s misfortune or fallings would always bring him a bit of happiness. 

“What? Seriously. I can smell them at that old Motel 6 from here. Allison didn’t even have to tell me.” 

He felt so terrible, using Scott like this, but it was for his own safety. Stiles needed to spy on them for everyone involved so they could be taken out and Scott could be safe. He could be a hero for a little while. It wasn’t like it could hurt too bad, saving people. 

They talked about stupid stuff for a while like they used to. It was a little awkward and wasn’t quite as smooth as it used to be, but it was nice to be around Scott again. They were best friends for a reason, even if Stiles had gone and died on them and ruined it all. 

“How’s the reason for me being able to visit you coming along?” Scott asked when Stiles was climbing up on his bed to exit via the window. 

Stiles paused, one leg out onto the roof. “It’s gonna need a little more work. Derek’s only keeping you out to use me as a bartering chip against you. Wants you in his pack and all.” 

Scott frowned. “What a butthead. I’ve already told him I’m never joining his pack so it’s just stupid and mean.” 

Stiles grinned and put his other leg through the window. “Pretty much.” 

“See ya, Stiles.” 

“Yeah, see ya.” 

Stiles finished going through the window and barely kept himself from totally breaking his leg or something, not that he'd be able to feel it or anything. And hell if he was going back to Derek's, there was a shoddy Motel 6 awaiting his presence.

* * *

He probably could have thought this through better. 

Since his nose was not of the werewolf variety, Stiles wasn’t sure if he smelled like Derek because he was wearing his clothes, Scott because he’d just spent an hour or so in his room, or if his overwhelming nothingness totally canceled out everything. 

He ended up sitting in the woods for an hour to try and combat it. Or, well, he assumed it was an hour but his sense of time was screwed up pretty badly now that his body functions were out of the picture. Biorhythms were one thing, but not feeling any kind of hunger or thirst or need to relieve himself messed him up just as bad. 

The Motel 6 was on the opposite side of town from the Hale House and only a step above being skeezy. Beacon Hills didn’t get a lot of tourists and there was such a ridiculously nice hotel in the next town over that no one in Beacon Hills ever really invested in anything but the Motel 6 or one of the three bed and breakfasts. Needless to say, Stiles didn’t have much hope for the Alpha’s taste in living arrangements, but then again Derek lived in the burnt out shell of a house his family died in and had that short bout of living in a warehouse when kanima was out and terrorizing. Maybe werewolves just hated nice things. 

There were only three cars in the Motel 6 parking lot, and only one of them was from out of state, but he really had no way to judge if any of them were the Alpha Pack’s. Sure, his money was on the car with the Oregon license plate, but Oregon really wasn’t _that_ far from Beacon Hills. Not far enough for the Alpha Pack, anyway. The whole idea of them seemed so foreign to Stiles that they might as well have been from China. 

The bored looking young woman at the front desk didn’t even put down her book when Stiles came in, nervously fidgeting because _holy God, social interaction when he was supposed to be dead_. 

There was a bell on the desk but Stiles didn’t know if he should ring it or not. The receptionist was still reading her book, something with a dog on the cover though Stiles couldn’t make out the title from his position, and he wasn’t sure if he was even allowed to ring it when the she was clearly already there. 

He shifted from foot to foot and put his hands in his pockets, then pulled them out again. There was a mirror behind the desk directly across from him, and Stiles figured it was to keep people from stealing when the receptionist’s back was turned, but for all he knew it was probably just a weird decoration choice. He smiled to himself in it, practicing his flirtatious grin because damn it, he needed to get information and it was a lucky break that there was a girl manning the front desk. Maybe if he channeled enough inner Abercrombie and Fitch model, or hell, even just enough Jackson, Scott, Derek, he could overcome his ugly awkwardness enough to get her interested. 

Stiles ended up ringing the bell, shoving his hands into his pockets quickly after. 

“Can I help you?” the receptionist asked with a smile, setting her book down while she pulled out her ear buds. Oh. She’d been listening to music. 

“Yeah,” Stiles said, attempting to get his flirt on. Only his smile ended up looking more like a grimace than a smile. 

There was a heavy silence then and her smile pulled tighter. Stiles’ clenched his fists in his pockets. 

“Something wrong?” she asked. 

“Uh, no. Um. I just didn’t expect to see someone so beautiful.” 

So he was stealing lines from Derek, sue him. He was sixteen and never actually flirted with anyone, unless his attempts on Lydia were counted but he’s not sure that was even considered partially flirting, they were so bad. He wasn’t supposed to know how to flirt yet. 

It was a shame that his inner Derek flirting only really worked for the real Derek, apparently. The receptionist rolled her eyes and made a move to pick up her book again. 

“Nice try, hun. I like my men to be old enough to shave.”

“I shave!” 

“The answer’s still no, hun.” 

Stiles was not going to pout because a twenty-something year old woman turned him down. He wasn’t. 

“Um, okay then,” Stiles said, gears whirring in his head to think of a different tactic. One that would preferably work for a sixteen year old boy. “I, um, one of my friends is here and wants me to meet a group of her friends but I forgot what room she’s in. Lacy? She should be with at least two others, twins. One with short hair and the other with long hair and a scar on her face.”

The receptionist shrugged. “Sorry, kid. I’m not allowed to give you any information about room numbers. Confidentiality and all that. But you could try giving your friend a call?”

Well that sucked. But a Stilinski wasn’t a Stilinski if they gave up on something that early. 

“I’ve been trying to call her for the last half hour. I think her phone’s dead or something?” 

“That’s too bad, but I still can’t help you.”

The receptionist put her ear buds back in and picked up her book, ending the conversation. Stiles rang the bell a few more times to no avail. 

He was just leaving the building when he heard her call out to him. 

“Hey, kid!” 

Stiles turned slowly, uncertain of what to expect. The receptionist was leaning across her desk waving at him more to get his attention than to call him over.

“Yeah?”

“It’s bugging me, but you look really familiar.” 

Oh, fuck. That’s right. He’s supposed to be dead. 

Stiles looked to his right, desperate for something to latch onto as an excuse. There were a stack of papers by the door, and to his dismay his school photo from last year was plastered on the front page next to a headline that read, “Boy’s body still missing.” 

“Um, I dunno why,” Stiles squeaked out. “I’ve been getting that a lot lately.” 

She stared at him, mouth open in badly masked confusion. “Huh. That so.” 

“Uh, yep.” 

“Was hoping you were a movie star or something,” she muttered and turned back to her book. Stiles felt relief drain the tension from his shoulders. He’d be so glad when this mess was over and Scott was safe. Especially since that good karma would probably bring him back to life or something. Hopefully.

Looked like it was onto Plan C, aka setting off all the car alarms in the parking lot and sneaking onto the computer to check which rooms were occupied while the receptionist dealt with that mess. Stiles may have also grabbed a stack of newspapers that he may have accidently on purpose set on fire too. If his face ended up on camera, it was okay. It was all for Scott, and besides, it wasn’t like they could arrest a dead person. Even if said dead person’s body was currently missing. 

Stiles didn’t even want to think about implications of a dead person’s face ending up moving and on a camera when their body was missing. Body-suits were among the first of the ideas Stiles came up with himself before deciding that it was probably best to just pretend the Beacon Hills Police were very lazy and stupid and didn’t check the cameras outside of a grody Motel 6 where there was a mild disturbance.

There were six rooms occupied, and none owned by a Lacy, but that was okay. Stiles had no trouble with the idea of listening outside of each one to narrow things down. 

There were people having sex behind door number one, and Stiles heard more Gods, Jeffs, Fasters, and Dawns than anything that resembled a Lacy or sounded like one of the girls who’d cut him up. He was really hoping that that wasn’t an Alpha Pack room, but Stiles was pretty sure he could safely cross that off his list. 

Stiles couldn’t hear anything in the next two rooms to his disappointment, but he got lucky on the fourth. He caught the word, “kanima,” and knew he hit the jackpot. 

The voices were muffled, but Stiles was happy he could hear what he could. They hadn’t noticed him yet, which was quite frankly _awesome_ , but he expected that. It was hard to notice someone who didn’t exist. 

“…don’t know the whereabouts of…rard but we’ve got a lead.” 

“You sure that’s our kanima?”

“Mrs. Mo…given information and tracked him down….wings so he’s highly evolved.” 

“And…at about De…has he responded?” 

“…shown no signs of reforming…likely have to kill…” 

“Greet the intruder, Aiden.” 

What? It came in loud and clear, almost like whoever spoke it was right in front of the door. He didn’t have time to react before a hand clamped down onto his shoulder and pressed him into the door, face mashed awkwardly against the grain.

“Well, hello there sweetpea,” a warm voice whispered in his ear and Stiles swallowed. “We weren’t going to worry about you since a dead kid isn’t exactly high on our list of important things to deal with, but you’re digging yourself a little too deep in your grave for us to ignore you much longer.” 

He’d made a terrible mistake.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long! I got out of the habit of writing and well, it's haard to get back into it. I meant to type more for this chapter but the transition was giving me troubles. Next chapter should be out much much faster, haha.
> 
> Warning, there's some allusions to torture in this chapter and some mild stuff done to a dead Stiles.

They had him tied to a shitty motel chair that looked more like it belonged in a kitchen, hands between bars that made up the back of the chair because apparently his skinny ass arms fit pretty easily between them. That was good reason number two to start working out. Reason one being to impress Lydia with his huge biceps, but Jackson becoming a werewolf and getting unnecessarily ripped kind of poked a hole in that reason. And well, being dead.

There was a man in a green polo behind him, pulling the rope looped around his wrists and the central bar in the chair tight enough that Stiles could feel his flesh pull. Great. There was no freaking way he was going to be able to stitch up _rope burns_ with the freaking fishing line once he got back to Derek’s. If he got back to Derek’s. And damn that was a shitty thought. 

Lacy, or rather the woman Stiles was pretty sure was Lacy because outside of the twins there was no other ladies in the room barking orders, was lounging back onto one of the full sized beds, the very picture of relaxed with arms splayed out to her side and her legs crossed at the edge of the bed. She wasn’t anything like Stiles pictured when he thought “alpha of the pack of alphas.” Tough, big, muscles as big as Derek’s. That’s what he pictured. But no, Lacy was this tiny thirty-year-old woman with soft brown eyes and blond hair that Stiles was pretty sure looked a whole lot like Shirley Temple’s if Shirley Temple let it grow down past her shoulders. 

“Stiles,” Lacy started, smiling sweetly, and Stiles would have maybe felt at ease if she hadn’t known his freaking name. “Do you want to tell me what you thought you were doing?” 

“Do you want to tell me how you know my name?” he said, voice surprisingly even. It almost made him want to laugh. He’d been in so many hostage situations since Scott had accidentally gotten involved in the whole werewolf business that his voice naturally took on an air of calmness. And when he was twelve and still scared of normal things like bank robbers he thought being the sheriff’s son would be trouble. 

“Baby, your face has been plastered all over the place,” Scarface—one of the twins—cut in for Lacy. She was leaning against the wall on the other side of the end table. 

“Aiden, I didn’t ask you to explain,” Lacy said and it was so sharp and cutting that Stiles was beginning to see exactly why she was the alpha. She was fucking scary. 

But why would she intentionally let Stiles know Scarface’s—Aiden’s—name? It wasn’t like she was stupid. She’d somehow beaten out all the other alphas to be in charge, and hell if it was off of pure strength. There was a freaking huge man next to the door and if she could out-strongman a man who looked like they could out bench-press Derek and lift his whole fucking house or something, Stiles would eat his socks. Or rather Isaac’s socks. 

He couldn’t guess her motives, and hell if he knew what she was playing at.

Lacy turned her eyes back towards Stiles and Stiles had to suppress a wince as Polo-shirt moved to his ankles with more freaking rope. He wasn’t exactly being gentle.

“As Aiden so clearly pointed out, your name really wasn’t difficult to find out. But I am curious about how a body walked off all on its own and managed to find its way here?” 

They didn’t have any kind of idea about him then, not that Stiles really thought they would. Aiden and her twin wouldn’t have only carved shit into his stomach if that were the case. 

Stiles licked his lips, suddenly glad that there was no chance in hell that they could hear his heartbeat. Couldn’t show a wild animal you were scared, right? He was confident, he was cool. This couldn’t be as bad a freaking _Gerard_.

“I don’t know, why don’t you ask your good friend the deer? Or the opossum even? Ringing any bells?” 

Polo-shirt snorted from his crouched position on the floor over Stiles’ ankles, and Stiles tried to wiggle enough in his rope cage to kick him. It failed, and Lacy raised her eyebrows high up on her forehead. 

“The werewolves?” 

“You been leaving presents in anyone else’s doorways?”

Lacy smirked and Polo-shirt finished tying him up. About time. He moved to stand behind Stiles and it made him uncomfortable that he couldn’t see him. 

“Not that it concerns you, but no.”

“And, uh, plan on leaving any others any time soon?” 

Lacy quirked her head to the side, and it looked a hell of a lot like Lydia did when she was solving a particularly troublesome problem. The thing was, Lydia never ran into a problem she couldn’t solve, and Stiles had a feeling Lacy was the same. 

“You sure do talk a lot about nothing when you’re scared. Interesting, but I think I’ll move back to the original question. What are you doing here, Stiles?” 

“I’m not fucking _scared_ ,” Stiles bit out, and as soon as he saw the look on Lacy’s face he knew it was the wrong choice. 

“Oh, you’re not?” she asked, feigning surprise. Her voice dropped down a few decibels as she said, “Guess we better change that then. Elliot.” 

Polo-shirt must have been Elliot because he didn’t see the other twin or Beefcakes move an inch when she said the name. He didn’t have time to think about what else that meant before someone grabbed the rope around his wrists and yanked up. Stiles felt the ropes bite in, and he knew he should be hurting, screaming, _anything_. 

“Now I know you don’t feel pain, Stiles, but I think you’ll find that violence has its other uses,” Lacy said, uncrossing and recrossing her legs. Elliot must have shifted his grip on the ropes because it was putting pressure on a different area of Stiles’ wrists. 

“Do you hear that,” she said, “it’s the sound of your flesh ripping.” She was quiet then, as if she wanted Stiles to truly listen for it, and he was ashamed that he actually tried.

“I don’t hear a fucking thing,” Stiles said, and Elliot responded by yanking the rope with a particularly hard jerk. 

Lacy made a few cooing noises, as if his inability to hear, or want to hear, his flesh tear was pitiable. “Ooh, too bad, sweetie. It’s a really nice noise. And even better, in a little while we’ll start to hit the bone! And I can tell you from experience that that’s a glorious sound.”

Stiles grew quiet, pulling his eyes off her face and focusing on the carpet a few feet over from where Lacy sat. What was she getting at? 

“You want to start talking yet?” Lacy asked, and Stiles turned his eyes back towards her. A mistake. She had a confident grin on her face

“You think you’re scaring me? I’ve been on the wrong side of a werewolf before, you know.” 

He survived Peter, and that had been fucking pale in comparison to what Gerard did to him in the basement, did to Erica and Boyd while he watched. But they both wanted him to get to Scott, and Stiles didn’t know if he could do that again to his best friend. He felt like the fucking weak human wink. Sure, go hit Stiles because Scott’s the important one and hey, he’s human he’s easy to get to. 

“Oh, I don’t doubt it. I just thought you might like to keep your hands attached to your body. Don’t want that daddy sheriff of yours to get those sent to him in a box, do you?”

Stiles made the mistake of swallowing and Lacy’s eyes tracked the movement. He didn’t even _need_ to swallow anymore, it was entirely a nervous gesture, and Stiles knew it was over as soon as it happened. Bingo, they’d found one of his weak points. 

Scott could protect himself, maybe not from the alpha pack, but he’d fair a better chance than his dad who didn’t even know about werewolves because Stiles didn’t have the balls to man up and tell him. 

Shit it sucked being human. If he was even a little bit like Scott, he could get out of there, or make an effort at least. But he wasn’t even close anymore as a dead human. There was nothing to relate to, nothing to feel like a part of something greater. Scott and Derek may be werewolves, but they’re still far too human for death. 

The alpha pack didn’t seem like they were going to try and kill him, hell, they might know it’s just as futile as Stiles did, but they could easily use him. And, well, if he couldn’t die he’d at least try and keep that from happening maybe. 

“I’m just, uh, here to satisfy my own curiosity,” Stiles said quietly. Elliot’s hands didn’t pull away from the rope, but he stopped tugging from what Stiles could feel. “Derek won’t tell me why you guys are here, and well, I thought I could help him since I’m dead and all,” Stiles added more confidently. He made a move to scratch at his neck with a sheepish grin, but the rope caught and held and he felt stupid that he’d forgotten about it. 

Lacy nodded her head once and Elliot let go of the rope completely. “I’ve made it no secret that we’re here for the kanima. Derek was just a…side project, we’ll say.” 

She was lying, omitting something. She had to be. 

“Why the hell did you leave that animal on Jackson’s doorstep then?”

He wasn’t a kanima, Stiles remembered the werewolf transformation scene a little too clearly for his liking, and he definitely wasn’t an alpha. It just didn’t add up. 

“Think about it some more. You’ll come to the answer soon enough.”

She seemed almost bored with Stiles, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Yeah, sure, that meant she probably wasn’t going to cut off his hands or whatever, but hell if it didn’t hurt his pride. 

“April. Aiden.”

Lacy stood up and stretched while the twins—the formerly unnamed twin was apparently April—stalked over with matching, wide grins. Elliot stepped aside to give them room to do whatever it was they wanted while Beefcakes walked over to the spot Lacy formerly was an plopped his ass down like he belonged there. 

April grabbed his hands and Aiden crouched down to grab his ankles. If he were any less dead he’d probably make jokes about blowjobs or twin threesomes, but it really only served to remind him that he’d never had one and was never going to get one unless someone had a big necrophilia kink. 

They picked him and the chair up easily and Stiles hazarded a guess that the whole double team thing was probably a show since one hundred and forty-seven pounds plus whatever the chair weighed was not heavy enough to need more than one alpha werewolf. Or they did it purposefully so it would hurt someone living, judging by the way the rope bit into his skin with the position. 

They threw him into the bathroom with practiced ease—the chair landed so perfectly he didn’t even tip. April went about untying his hands while Aiden locked the door behind them. 

“Toilets there, don’t piss on our floors or you’ll be cleaning it with your tongue, and if you make too much noise we’ll slit your throat,” Aiden said, eyes turned to the ceiling while she listed things off her fingers. “If you—wait, you’re dead. Why am I even bothering with this?” 

“Oh shit, yeah,” Stiles heard behind him, and suddenly the rope was pulled taut and his hands were tied tighter than they were before. 

April walked around the chair and stopped next to her sister, hands cocked on her hips. “Since you’re dead we don’t have to do this shit. Just sit tight and keep your mouth shut and everything will be right as rain.” 

Stiles rolled his eyes. “I don’t think you know who you’re talking to here. It’s physically impossible for me to keep from talking—I’d probably risk a stroke trying to stop.” 

“Good thing you’re dead then,” April deadpanned, and Aiden came forward and dropped to her knees in front of Stiles, reaching for his feet. _Ouch_.

“Didn’t know you were into necrophilia,” he said, grasping at anything else. And okay he couldn’t hold off on the blowjob jokes, but she was right _there_ , on her knees. 

“I want the name and numbers of any one who has done sexual _anything_ with you because I don’t believe it,” Aiden said, and Stiles frowned at the back of her head. She started pulling at one of his shoes, dislodging it from the rope and slipping it over his heel. And what? Stiles never heard of hostages being freaking _shoeless_. 

It was when she pulled off his sock and stood up that Stiles realized what she was doing. Aiden was going to freaking gag him with Isaac’s nasty sock that had touched his dead feet and the inside of Derek’s shoes. 

Stiles threw his head back as far as he could, trying to gain some distance between him and the sock, and said, “Wait, wait, I can be quiet you don’t need to put that thing in my mouth.” 

April snorted from her place near the door and Aiden only rolled her eyes. 

“Wait, why are you even putting me in this bathroom? I don’t understand why you’re just keeping me hrppth.”

Stiles was suddenly glad he couldn’t taste anything, or breathe even, but he wouldn’t even be there if he was alive so who knew if either side of the coin really had the upper hand. The sock stretched his jaw in an uncomfortable way, but other than that it felt like he’d just stuck a shit ton of ash in his mouth. 

The twins turned to go through the door, but before they fully stepped out April answered his question. Sort of. “We’ve got shit to do and if you insist on getting in the middle of it we’re going to take you out of the equation.”

Stiles expected them to slam the door, but they didn’t. It shut with a soft click before he heard some muffled laughing and another door—probably the main door to the room—shut.

He couldn’t tell how long he’d been in there, sitting in the bathroom. It was dead silent and Stiles didn’t even have the company of his own heartbeat or the rise and fall of his chest. The lights shut off after a while—they must’ve been attached to a motion sensor—and even though Stiles knew he was there, he wasn’t sure he actually felt it. Not even his thoughts could drown out the quiet. 

Stiles hated being trapped, defenseless. He was dead, but even when he was human he didn’t care much about his life as long as he kept Scott and his dad safe. It almost made him want to laugh now. No, he should’ve cared about his life because he felt miserable knowing what they thought about his death. Or Scott’s opinion at least. He didn’t even want to think about his dad. 

He swallowed and shifted his arms in their rope prison, trying to assess the damage. It was disheartening that he couldn’t even dry heave when his thumb slid under a layer of skin because _shit._ Fishing line wasn’t going to fix that at all. 

Maybe it would’ve been a few minutes before it bit into his bones, or maybe less depending on Elliot’s freaky werewolf strength. Would he have been able to go straight through the bone with the rope or would he have had to snap it with his hands? Stiles’ first instinct was to go with Elliot snapping it with his hands, but who honestly knew with werewolves. Stiles bit down on the sock in his mouth. Then what would his father’s reaction be to getting his son’s hands in the mail? Stiles could imagine him spending his days searching hard and long for Stiles’ body just so he could finally be put to rest, and then coming home to open up a new bottle of Jack Daniel’s and drink and drink until the memory of Stiles was nothing more than a disconcerting dream. He remembered what his dad was like when his mom died. Stiles had more than enough images of that to picture his dad. The hands would kill him. On par with that one time Stiles found him with his mom’s old wedding dress when they were cleaning out the attic. 

He wanted to cry about it so bad, fill up the room’s silence with shaking sobs and loud sniffles, but more than anything he wanted to see his dad and tell him he was alright. His body was safe. 

But that was depressing all in itself. Stiles tried to think about Scott instead, but that only served to remind him that the alphas had neglected to answer his question about whether or not they were going to challenge more werewolves. Scott wasn’t in the clear yet, and Stiles felt more useless than he ever had.

So he sat as still as he could, closed his eyes, and thought, ‘ _I’m still here,_ ’ over and over again in his head so he knew he wasn’t really dead yet.

* * *

“Shut the door you…” 

“Calm your…get shut.” 

Apparently the Alphas were back from wherever it was that they went. Stiles leaned back in his chair. Maybe in a moment they’d untie him and let him go? Hah. Fat chance. 

“…discuss the…bouts of the…” 

Stiles’ eyes snapped open. Was that…was that _Peter’s_ voice? As far as Stiles knew Peter had yet to come back home, and his suspicions about the phone call the night before ran through his head. Was Peter in cahoots with the Alpha Pack? And did Derek _know_ about it? 

He shifted his head forward to see if he could hear anything else, but it was pretty much useless considering his position only really allowed for a measly inch or three of movement. Scott needed to know

“…two betas…information,” he heard Peter say.

Stiles bit down on the sock in frustration because that was all he could freaking make out. They must have gone to the furthest point away from the bathroom and started their discussion there because he heard less than when he was five feet over and behind the solid room door. 

They continued their conversation and Stiles became increasingly annoyed at his inability to make out anything but the most basic words or phrases. How was he supposed to warn Scott or tell Derek or whatever if all he had in his repertoire was stupid un-pieced together things like, “Two betas” or “In the park”? 

The door shut after a while and maybe thirty seconds later Beefcakes slid open the bathroom door. Stiles swallowed around the sock, preparing himself to be lifted and carried over to wherever he was supposed to be next, but Beefcakes walked right by him and hawked a loogie in the toilet. Stiles would’ve cringed if it hadn’t quickly been followed by the sound of a zipper and water splashing in the water bowl. Right. No, Stiles wasn’t the priority. Pissing was. 

He heard the zipper pull up again and he waited for Beefcakes to enter his line of sight and exit the bathroom again, but instead Beefcakes crouched down behind him and lifted him and the chair by the seat. _God_ , the guy hadn’t even flushed, let alone washed his hands. 

Stiles was set in the then empty motel room in view of the television and Beefcakes came around and pulled the sock out of his mouth. Oh God, an indirect blow job with a nasty ass Alpha. 

“Lacy’ll be back in an hour or so,” Beefcakes said, and his voice was surprisingly soft for such a large, muscular man. Maybe it was a born werewolf thing because Derek was the same way. “I’ve got a couple questions for you and if you’re a good boy and answer them I’ll let you keep the sock out of your mouth.”

“What makes you think I’ll—“ 

Beefcakes raised the sock in his hand and said, “Sock.” 

Stiles threw his head back and frowned. “Oh man you didn’t even wash your _hands_.” 

Beefcakes snorted and chucked the sock onto the bed closest to Stiles, following with his body soon after. “You’re dead.” 

“Thank you, I hadn’t realized that yet.” 

Beefcakes shifted so he was leaning back slightly on his arms on the bed where he sat. “I’m not as nice as Lacy, y’know.” 

“Then why the hell are you letting her lead you guys? You could easily beat her into submission, couldn’t you?” 

“Because I trust her to make the right decisions, and when she doesn’t we let her know.” 

And Stiles had absolutely nothing to say to that. Zero. It made too much sense for a werewolf as far as he was concerned, but then again he was mostly used to dealing with Derek, who was a cocky son of a bitch, and Scott, who hadn’t really accepted himself yet. 

So he said the next thing that came to his mind instead. “Why was Peter Hale here?” 

Beefcakes raised his eyebrows at that, but didn’t otherwise reveal anything. “Thought you’d know, seeing as you came here for Derek Hale and all.” 

“So he _was_ here?” 

Beefcakes sat upright and set his elbows on his knees. It made his arm muscles budge in a way that made Stiles feel uncomfortably inferior. “Not recently.” 

“What, Alphas only consider the last five minutes to be ‘recent’?” 

“Look kid, I know what you’re trying to do. Now let’s reel it back and get you to answer some questions before Lacy gets back and decides to _really_ send your hands to the Sheriff.” 

Stiles curled his toes and dropped his gaze to the ground. “Okay,” he muttered, but he had no doubt that Beefcakes heard him. 

The questions weren’t any different from the ones Lacy asked and in the end the sock was back in Stiles’ mouth, to his disdain.

* * *

Lacy coming back wasn’t nearly as exciting as Stiles had initially thought. Beefcakes had been sprawled out on a bed, flipping channels so fast that Stiles hadn’t bothered to get engrossed in watching something, when the door lock clicked and Lacy and Elliot came through the open door. 

“Anything?” Lacy had asked while she slid off her shoes and Beefcakes had grunted a simple “no.” It was all so domestic feeling and Stiles didn’t know what to make of it. 

Then Lacy told Elliot to put Stiles outside at midnight and she slipped into the bathroom. 

The whole thing seemed a little too easy. Outside? Already? Stiles had been nothing but a pain in the ass and he was already being released? Couldn’t say he complained though.

* * *

Outside was not what Stiles thought it was, not at all. He thought he was being _released_ , but nope, not at all. Outside was really a small eight by eight by fifteen hole in the ground with chicken wire weaved with sticks and leaves on the top out in the forest behind the motel, which Stiles was promptly dropped into, chair and all. 

“Stiles?” he heard from somewhere behind him but he couldn’t twist his head back around far enough to see who. He could’ve sworn it sounded like Erica, but Erica didn’t sound that broken. 

“Yeah?” he answered back, thankful that they’d taken the sock out, and he felt fingers against his wrists, untying the ropes. Stiles pulled his arms through as soon as the rope dropped down and he went to work on the ropes around his left foot, still barefoot. Erica appeared in his peripherals and started on the ropes on his right. 

The one small glance was enough for his stomach to sink in his stomach. Her hair was bunched and tangled, and even though there wasn’t much light in the hole he could still tell it was much darker than the blond it was supposed to be. Her face was clear and normal like any other werewolf’s, but the heaviness in her eyes told him it was healed and not that Erica had been untouched. 

“What happened to you?” he asked, rubbing his wrists. He’d definitely have to find ace bandages or something because there was no way to stitch his burn and there was no way in hell he wanted the torn flesh to snag on something if he wasn’t careful. Gross. 

Erica crouched down in front of him, frantically pressing her hand to his heart. “No, Stiles what’s wrong with _you_.” 

“Oh, that’s right you don’t know,” Stiles said. “I’m, uh, I’m dead.” 

Erica’s hand stilled against his chest and he made no move to remove it. “What? But you’re _talking_. I thought you’d died when they dropped you in here but then you started talking and I don’t _understand,_ Stiles.” 

“I can’t really answer you there. I woke up dead and now I’m here.” 

Erica frowned and shifted enough to press her claws into his chest. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” 

“Exactly what I said. I’m dead and I don’t know why I’m still alive.” 

“That makes zero sense.” 

“Yeah thanks I knew that.” 

Erica pulled her hand back and sort of collapsed on the ground in front of Stiles’ chair. “How...How’s Derek?” 

“Asshole-ish,” Stiles deadpanned and Erica snorted. “How’s Boyd?” 

Erica sighed and stood up, brushing dirt off her pants. Whatever he was, it must not have been good the way she was acting. “He’s behind you,” she said and she walked over to one of the corners of the dirt room, disappearing from the limited light in the hole. 

Stiles had to squint to see even the barest outlines, but he could just make out Erica squatting beside an unmoving lump that could only be Boyd. 

“Erica…” Stiles said, unsure of much else. Had they been here “Outside” the entire time they’d been missing? It was November—they’d been missing for _months_. Stiles didn’t even want to know what it had been like. 

“Erica what have they been doing to you guys?”

Erica didn’t respond, choosing to rub what Stiles though was Boyd’s head and whisper something in his ear. 

“Erica,” Stiles said louder, firmer, and Erica startled. 

She stood up and turned around abruptly with a nervous chuckle. “Sorry, I, uh, don’t hear so well on that side anymore.” 

What? “Why?” 

Erica’s face drooped, like the little happiness she’d been showing to Stiles was far too much for what she felt. She dropped her gaze to the ground and fidgeted with her fingers. But whatever she’d been taking her time to decide, she’d made her choice mere seconds later, stepping more into the light so Stiles could see. Erica gestured at her hair where it was darker before sliding her hands up and carefully pulling back the matted mess. 

And Stiles didn’t know what he was expecting but it sure wasn’t _that_. Her hair wasn’t dark because it was dirty—it was dark because she’d completely lost her ear and the blood had turned her blond hair a dark red. There wasn’t even a hole left. From her cheekbones to her hair line there was just flat, smooth skin. 

“W-what happened?” 

Erica let her hair drop from her hand and she let herself fall back next to Boyd with a small smile on her face. She looked defeated, and it was strange seeing it on her newly turned werewolf face. 

“The Alphas of course,” she said, and she lifted her hand to start running her fingertips down Boyd’s back. He still didn’t move. “We’ve been down here a long _long_ time. We switch holes every once in a while since they start to smell after me and Boyd have lived in them for a while and I don’t think the Alphas like the stench. You’re lucky that this is a new hole. We marinated in the last a little longer than usual.” 

“Why don’t you guys get out? The tops covered in chicken wire—you could just climb shoulders or use your werewolf powers or something and burst through.” 

Erica paused in her rubbing to throw her head back and let out the darkest laugh Stiles had ever heard come out of someone his age. “You don’t think we tried that? The whole place is fucking _covered in wolfsbane_ and it burns to touch. It doesn’t seem to affect the Alphas, but whatever. All I know is that last time we tried Boyd came back looking like _this_ and I lost my fucking ear.” 

She hunched in further on herself and resumed her rubbing. Stiles tracked the movement, unsure of what else. 

“Why?” he croaked out. Why would the Alphas hurt, no, _torture_ them? They said they were after the kanima, but why would they keep Erica and Boyd down in a hole? They only knew about Jackson, but Jackson was a werewolf, not a kanima. But then again Scott had said something about a kanima with wings. 

“That all you know how to say? _Why?_ ” 

Her words were harsh and unforgiving and Stiles didn’t know how to respond. 

“I’ll let you in on a secret, Stiles. I stopped asking ‘why’ a long, long time ago.”

Erica turned more towards Boyd and leaned against him, and no matter what else Stiles said she tuned him out. Or she chose not to hear him. Stiles wasn’t really sure at that point.

* * *

“Stiles, hey Stiles!” 

Stiles snapped his eyes open with a jerk, almost falling straight off his chair with the movement. Erica was standing in front of him, a small smile on her face. Light was pouring in so it must’ve been morning, but Stiles didn’t remember ever falling asleep. 

“Food time,” she said, and Stiles noticed the water bottles and wrapped sandwiches on the ground by his feet. Three of each. 

“I don’t eat,” he said quietly, and Erica raised an eyebrow. 

Shrugging, she said, “More for me and Boyd then. We only get one bottle of water a day anyway. Might be nice to have an extra half.” 

Erica ate her sandwich and drank some water before she even touched Boyd, who she basically had to manhandle to get him to eat any. He was silent the whole time and Stiles wouldn’t have known he was even alive if he hadn’t chewed the food Erica placed in his mouth himself. 

“What were you doing last night,” Erica asked once Boyd was settled again. 

“Uh, sitting? I didn’t do anything after we’d stopped talking.” 

Erica gave him a curious look. “No, the dirt thing. What was that all about?” 

Dirt thing? 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” 

“Stiles, why the hell were you eating dirt? That’s what I’m asking.” 

Stiles furrowed his brows. “I honestly didn’t do anything once we stopped talking. I don’t remember eating dirt or whatever.” 

“Stiles I know I haven’t talked to anyone in over a month, but I’m not fucking _crazy_. I was apparently honest to your for nothing.” 

Erica threw herself down next to Boyd in a huff and crossed her arms over her knees, ignoring Stiles. 

She thought he was lying? Stiles didn’t even know what he was supposed to be lying _about_. 

“Erica…are you saying I ‘got up’ last night?” 

Erica turned her eyes towards him long enough to glare and then went back to staring at the ground. 

Okay, then. Guess she was done talking. But assuming that her answer was yes…did that mean that’s what he did when he got up? Ate dirt? Seemed like a stupid thing to do to be honest, but hell, he was a walking dead person. It couldn’t get weirder than that. 

The rest of the day was fairly uneventful. Another round of sandwiches were dropped down later on and that was the extent of excitement

* * *

“I think we should try and get out,” Stiles said after they had gotten their daily allotment of food and water and Erica had finished feeding herself and Boyd. 

“You’ve been here like a day and a half and you already want to risk your sanity and/or body parts?” 

Well duh. He couldn’t stay there any longer and if he was being honest with himself, he couldn’t let himself end up like Erica or Boyd. The chances of anyone getting them out were slim. Erica and Boyd had been there upwards of four months and Stiles was dead. There were very few people that knew he was a live and even less that knew he was with the Alpha Pack. 

“Yeah, listen. You can’t touch the cage up top, but _I_ can. If you stand on the chair and I get on your shoulders, we should easily be able to push that thing up.” 

Erica scoffed and slumped against the dirt wall where she sat. “Yeah, and what do we do about Boyd?” 

“Throw him up out of the hole?” 

“Yeah. And then what? The Alpha Pack is going to know and I can’t run from them when I’m at full strength, let alone like I am now carrying Boyd.” 

Stiles sighed and buried his head in his palms. This fucking _sucked_. He was stuck in a freaking hole with no way out. He literally just had to sit there until _something_ , whatever that something was, happened and he could get out. 

Scott would officially lose his best friend, his dad would never see his body, Derek would lose or something, and Stiles was left serving out the rest of his energy sentence in a hole watching his former classmates _die_. 

Erica stood up then, her face soft, and Stiles tracked the movement. She stuck out her hand and reached for Stiles’ shoulder, squeezing when she reached it. 

“Hey,” she said softly, and her hand was so so warm against his body. “Peter’s been trying to get us out. We’ll get out.” 

_Peter_. Was that what he was doing there yesterday?

“How do you know? And why would you _trust_ him?” 

The whole thing seemed like a really stupid thing to have faith in. Peter…Stiles wouldn’t trust him as far as he could throw him, and he couldn’t throw him very far at all. 

Erica laughed and pulled back her hand. “We weren’t always in this hole, and we learned the hard way we shouldn’t try and get out ourselves. We don’t have many options Stiles. Just wait, we’ll get out.” 

Waiting? Stiles would rather slit his throat, but it seemed like he didn't have any other choice. And that fucking _sucked_.


	6. Chapter 6

Waiting wasn’t too bad after a while. The first day or so he mostly just paced, rounding the perimeter of the small hole as best he could. His thoughts kept him moving and it seemed like he couldn’t stop. His dad, Scott, the Alphas and their plans, and hell, even himself. He jumped from one subject to the next and they all met at one point—he had to get out. Only he couldn’t. So he paced. 

Erica had refrained from mentioning the dirt-eating thing after the first time, but Stiles was pretty sure he was still doing it judging by the looks she shot him when he thought he wasn’t looking.

The Alphas continued to throw three of each item down every mealtime, and Erica was right. It was like the wolfsbane coating the wire didn’t bother them at all. Stiles was pretty sure wolfsbane still worked on Derek so it couldn’t have been an alpha thing, unless it was an alpha-of-a-really-big-and-or-strong-pack thing. Derek wasn’t much of that yet, but maybe one day. Unfortunately Stiles didn’t really have the _time_ to test that hypothesis. Plus Derek was out of betas as it was and Scott would definitely not allow more bitings. 

Eventually he just accepted it. The waiting. Erica spent her days sitting next to Boyd, who never moved unless Erica pulled him up to eat or use the bathroom, and she seemed okay. Well objectively okay. Hell she’d been at it for months so maybe waiting really was the best way. So after he came to one morning he sat right down next to her instead of starting his usual pacing ritual. It wasn’t ideal—his brain still never settled down—but he didn’t feel so alone with Erica next to him. And maybe that was all it took.

* * *

It was a chilly Friday morning right before the food and water for the day was dropped off when Erica suddenly stilled next to him and angled her good ear towards the hole opening. 

“What?” Stiles asked, a little nervous. Erica didn’t usually perk up like a dog greeting its master when it was food time. 

“I hear—the footsteps are different,” she answered, distracted. 

“So what? The Alphas get someone new to feed you guys?” 

Erica shushed him and Stiles rolled his eyes. He was under the impression Erica’s hearing wasn’t as good, but this was pretty clearly better hearing than his own. She must have faked half the times she “couldn’t hear,” but then again Stiles expected as much. It was a good deflection method. 

When Stiles could finally hear the footsteps as well Erica stiffened and Boyd let out a low growl. And what? Stiles hadn’t heard Boyd make a sound in the five days he’d been there. Whoever it was, they were bad news, and hell if Stiles would stand for that. 

He grabbed the chair and flipped it, wielding it like the lion tamers in all the old circus cartoons did, and waited for the footsteps to draw near enough for him to see who it was. Erica’s form rippled in his peripherals and he knew she’d transformed. Whether it was stress or purposeful, Stiles didn’t know. And Boyd? Boyd didn’t move or speak save for his low, dark growling. 

The person’s shadow fell on the cage and into the hole, but Erica leaped up and grabbed the cage, blocking Stiles’ view, before he had the chance to see who or what it was. 

“Erica!” he yelled, and Erica screamed in response. The wolfsbane had to be hurting her, but she didn’t let up. Whoever was up there had to be awful. 

“Stiles!” he heard above Erica’s pained cries and Boyd’s growling, but it wasn’t Erica or Boyd’s voice. It was Allison’s. 

Stiles dropped the chair, his arms suddenly too weak to hold it up. “Allison?” 

“Yeah!” Allison replied, and Stiles was surprised she could hear it with how soft it was compared to the noise around them. The shadow shifted so Allison must have been trying to move and see him, but Erica moved on the cage as well. It suddenly reminded him of when he and Scott used to see who could hang on the monkey bars the longest, but the blisters they got were nothing compared to what Erica had to be getting. 

“I’m here for you but I can’t…” Allison trailed off and Erica snarled and rattled the cage top as best she could while she was hanging. 

Allison was there to save them? Or him? Made sense, not that Stiles was expecting it, but Stiles would take it. But he had to get Erica off the chicken wire first. It was hurting her and delaying rescue. 

Stiles set the chair up directly underneath Erica and climbed on top. The drop was fifteen feet from the surface, but the chair was two feet and Stiles was six, not to mention Erica’s hanging height. He could grab onto her easily. Erica kicked and scrambled, but she was far more concerned with growling and threatening Allison than she was about the wolfsbane or Stiles. So when Stiles leapt and grabbed for Erica’s knees, wrapping his arms around and locking them, Erica could only squirm before letting go. 

Stiles hit the chair hard, Erica on top of him, and if it didn’t break something it most definitely bruised the hell out of his ribs. Here’s hoping he could walk and all regardless of his bones’ current status. Like a zombie. They didn’t care if their guts were hanging out or if they were just a torso with head attached, they’d freaking use their tongue to get more brains and flesh. 

Erica stood up and grabbed Stiles’ collar to lift and throw him against the dirt wall next to Boyd. She dropped down in a defensive stance then, hands against the dirt even though they had to be killing her. 

“Erica, what are you _doing_?” Stiles said, pulling himself up and ignoring the way his back twinged with the movement. “She’s trying to _rescue_ us.” 

Erica snorted. “Last time we met she pumped me and Boyd with arrows. Then we met the Alphas. So no, Stiles, can’t say I trust her too much.” 

Stiles’ eyes widened at the information and he immediately looked up at Allison, who was looking down at them with concern. He had no doubt she heard every word out of Erica’s mouth, but she was choosing to ignore it. It had to be true then, but at the same time Allison wouldn’t hurt him. He was human, well undead human, and he was Scott’s best friend. 

“I think we should go with her.” 

Erica flipped around and glared at him as soon as the words were out of his mouth. “Are you _kidding?_ Stiles I just said she fucking pumped us full of arrows.” 

“It’s been months since then and I…I’m _sorry_ ,” Allison shouted from above them. Her face was turned away from them, like she was embarrassed, and her hands were oddly focused on removing the chicken wire off the top of the hole. 

Erica only snorted, dismissing the apology. 

“Look,” Stiles began, “Peter’s been trying to get you out for over four months with no success. I’m getting out with Allison now.” 

Erica’s anger faulted, and her wolf features melted straight off her face, leaving a broken girl. “Okay, let me get Boyd,” she mumbled softly, and the sound of Allison completely removing the chicken wire echoed her voice. 

Allison threw down a rope ladder seconds later and Stiles climbed it. Erica followed mere seconds later, Boyd on her back. 

“We’ve got about a five minute window before they realize I’m here so we should book it out of here as fast as possible,” Allison said as she replaced the wire over the hole. 

“Okay, is your car in the parking lot?” Stiles asked.

“Yeah, c’mon. It’s one of my dad’s armored ones.” 

Allison brushed off the dirt on her skinny jeans and gestured towards the motel with her head. They weren’t even a hundred yards off and Stiles didn’t even want to know how the Alphas didn’t get caught _keeping people in a hole in the ground_. 

They ran to her car as fast as possible, and even though Erica was completely suspicious of Allison and carrying Boyd, she still reached Allison’s car before Stiles did. Erica and Boyd piled into the back while Stiles threw himself into the passenger seat, and Allison peeled out of the parking lot. 

“Where am I taking you?” Allison asked when they hit downtown. They were approaching the main intersection and Stiles couldn’t believe he was actually out of the hole. Jesus, he was fucking out. No more pacing or sitting or worrying. He was free. 

“Why did you come for me?” he ended up saying instead of answering her, and Allison apparently opted to go to Derek’s. 

“Scott told you we’ve got cameras around the perimeter, right?” Allison answered, voice tight. 

Erica and Boyd were oddly quiet in the back, but maybe they were just overwhelmed. Fresh air and sunshine could do that. 

“Yeah, but _why_?” He was dead—he wasn’t going to get hurt. And yeah, he was thrilled to be out, but he didn’t need to be. 

Allison’s hands tightened around the steering wheel, and Stiles could see her bite her lip out of the corner of his eye. They were eight minutes away from Derek’s. 

“I…I didn’t want Scott coming for you instead. Not when I knew the times of day when the Alphas were out or distracted.” 

“You still care about him, don’t you.” It was a statement more than a question. Stiles wasn’t asking, he knew, not that he understood it. But that was just Scott and Allison. Despite all their problems, they still loved each other with all their hearts. Allison wouldn’t have put herself in so much danger for Scott otherwise.

“Yeah,” she breathed out, and Stiles watched the line of tension in her shoulders disappear. 

Five minutes away. 

“He still cares about you too, you know,” Stiles said, feeling oddly obligated to try and fix whatever was going on between Scott and Allison. They had both just helped him, and well, Scott was his best friend. He wanted him happy. 

Allison’s body went rigid. Okay, maybe Stiles did the wrong thing on that aspect. 

“Yeah, well, I wish he didn’t.” 

Stiles swallowed and turned forward to watch the car advance on the road instead of Allison’s face. 

They reached Derek’s what felt like seconds later, and for all the fuss that Erica put up when it was Allison doing the rescuing, she seemed almost reluctant to get out of the car. 

Stiles started walking up to the front door before his mind could tell him all the bad things that could happen coming to Derek’s after he’d ditched, with Erica and Boyd in tow. Things like Derek actually ripping his throat out, or killing him for real. And that would suck balls for sure, especially when seeing what the alphas did to Boyd and Erica, and seeing what Allison and Scott were doing to each other made him want to stay more than ever. He wanted to help in any way he could. 

He had gone barely two feet through the door when Derek pounced on him, appearing seemingly out of nowhere to press Stiles just inside against the wall, the door creaking shut beside them. For all the momentum he was carrying when he was moving, Derek’s hand was fairly gentle against Stiles neck, but _hell_ , Derek was freaking holding him by his neck against a wall and there was no version of the thing that made that okay. 

“Where were you?” Derek demanded, voice tight. And Stiles was taken aback a little by Derek’s fury because Stiles didn’t think Derek would even care that he was gone. 

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t crush my windpipe,” Stiles said instead of an answer. 

Derek didn’t roll his eyes and that surprised Stiles a little because that was exactly what he expected Derek to do. Instead he almost looked apologetic as he moved his hand to Stiles’ shoulder, which wasn’t a much better position but at least it wasn’t as threatening.

“You missed the scheduled appointments at the animal clinic _five days in a row_. How is Deaton supposed to help if you don’t let him?” 

“I don’t know,” Stiles said, and Derek’s grip shifted against his shoulder. 

“We’re going right now.” 

And what the hell? No way, José. Derek had two old but new pack members outside and (hopefully) approaching the door and he wanted to spend the precious reunion time watching dirt get thrown at Stiles. 

Stiles shot his hand up to grab Derek’s arm to stop him and Derek’s eyes zeroed in on the his wrists. Oh fuck, that’s right. The rope burns. 

“Where the _hell_ have you been, Stiles,” Derek said and it definitely wasn’t a suggestion. 

“Jesus, add a little more growl in there, won’t you,” Stiles grumbled and the pressure from Derek’s hand increased against his shoulder. They were going to have a chat about what was appropriate for discussions, and angry demands and physical harm were going on the “ _No under any circumstances_ ” list. 

“You can’t hear them? The heartbeats?” Stiles finally said, and he knew the exact moment Derek realized that what he was hearing definitely wasn’t Stiles because Stiles didn’t have one. His eyes grew comically large and he ripped his arm from Stiles’ grip, not that it took much strength to do so to be honest, and threw open the door to their right.

Derek cursed under his breath and let the door fall shut in favor of pushing Stiles against the wall with his hand again. 

“You didn’t,” he said, and Stiles rose and eyebrow because _duh_ , clearly he did. 

“You could have messed up the negotiation for Boyd and Erica, or _Jesus_ , gotten yourself killed. Did you ever think of that?” 

“You care about me—my well-being?” 

Derek took a step back and squeezed Stiles’ shoulder one last time before letting go. “Of course I don’t,” he said, and he opened the front door. 

He did. He totally did. And that was weird. Sure, it felt nice, but to be honest Stiles didn’t know what to think about it.

“We’re going to the animal clinic—all _four_ of us,” Derek said and he was out before he finished his sentence. Okay then.

* * *

The ride over was awkward and strange and Stiles wasn’t sure why. It was like Derek, Boyd, and Erica were dancing around each other and they didn’t so much as talk to each other. Derek was forced to put music on to combat the silence and when Brittney Spears started blasting he mumbled something about it being Isaac’s when he turned it down. And to top it all? Erica replied that they knew. For all intents and purposes they were acting like they’d never met each other, and that was really fucking weird. 

If Deaton was at all surprised to see Boyd and Erica with them he hid it well. As soon as they arrived he swept over and directed Boyd and Erica to the backroom, where he stayed for some time. Long enough for Stiles and Derek to sit down awkwardly in the waiting area, anyway. 

They were a seat apart, which was just enough room for Stiles to feel both comfortable and uncomfortable with the arrangement. 

Stiles shifted, clenching and unclenching his fists where they rested on his knees, and Derek side-eyed him from where he was sitting stiff and upright. He looked stressed, but then again he could probably hear what Deaton, Erica, and Boyd were doing. Or he couldn’t and that was what was bothering him. 

“Okay, look,” Stiles said, and Derek turned his face enough that one eye was looking straight ahead at Stiles and the other was still in the general direction of where Deaton was. “Let’s have a sharing circle. I’ll share a secret and you share a secret and maybe we can actually work together to protect Scott and everyone else.” 

Derek looked unimpressed with the idea, but he didn’t say no, and maybe that was just enough. 

“Okay. I. Okay. I think I want to tell my dad everything. The Alphas…threatened him, and I can’t leave him defenseless like that. I—“

“Okay,” Derek breathed, interrupting Stiles, and Stiles eyebrows came together in confusion. He wasn’t even looking at Stiles anymore. 

“O _kay_?”

“Yeah. We’ll go see him tonight.” 

And that was…Stiles didn’t know how to explain it but he was grateful. He thought he’d have to threaten Derek a little, or offer up some dirty details to bribe him if it took that, but it was seriously that easy the whole time? Guy didn’t guard the werewolf secret that well in that respect then, but maybe he just thought it was as good an idea as Stiles did. 

“You’re probably going to have to wolfman it out, y’know,” Stiles added and he really needed to shut up if he didn’t want to accidently talk Derek out of the idea. 

“I know.” 

“Oh. Okay. Um. Well, your turn then.”

Derek sighed and started picking at his jeans where a hole was frayed. Stiles raised his eyebrows and moved his hand in a _c’mon then_ gesture that Derek pretty much ignored. It was at least a minute before Derek spoke up. 

“I lost my virginity when I was fifteen.” 

And _that_ was what the big silent build-up was for? _That_? Stiles was not impressed. Well okay he was impressed in that dumb teenaged way where everyone, himself included, thought it was a race to lose their virginity first and Derek had pretty clearly beaten Stiles through and through.

“Oh my God, that is not a secret.” 

Derek started playing with the white strands of jean he’d released with all his fidgeting and mumbled, “Sure it is.” 

“No, c’mon, Derek. How is this sharing circle supposed to work if you won’t share? Seems like you don’t care about the members of your pack enough.” 

He pushed on the hole in his jeans with a frustrated growl and turned to look fully at Stiles, the bare beginnings of a glare flitting across his face. 

“Fine,” he ground out, “What do you want to know?” 

And that was definitely the question Stiles was waiting for. He had the freedom to ask anything. Well almost everything because he was pretty sure there were a lot of hot button questions that would send Derek skittering away. 

“What was Peter doing with the alphas?”

Stiles was kind of hoping Derek would be at least a little surprised at the question because he’d worked hard sleuthing for that answer, but Derek crushed that hope pretty fast when his facial expression didn’t even change. 

“Bartering,” Derek said with no hesitation, “Trying to get Boyd and Erica out.” 

“For over four months?”

“It was taking that long, yeah.” 

“You actually trusted him to do so? How do you know he wasn’t striking other deals?”

Derek frowned at the floor and Stiles was pretty sure he was getting close to one of the bad-issue topics, but he wasn’t going to stop now that he was near answers. He wanted, no, _needed_ to know.

“I don’t,” Derek breathed, picking his gaze up. 

“And, which question would that be a response to? There were two.” 

“Both.” 

One word answers. Great. Derek had regressed back to one word answers. Stiles thought they’d moved past that after they’d beaten Peter the first time.

“Okay, Captain Chatty, but why _Peter_?” 

Derek sighed again and it was quite possibly the most frustrated noise Stiles had heard come out of him since the conversation started. “Because Boyd and Erica were leaving last time I saw them,” Derek admitted quietly. “I didn’t think they wanted to see me.” 

“Oh.” That explained the awkwardness in the car then. Which begged the question of _why_ Boyd and Erica were leaving in the first place. 

There was a blanket of silence that fell on them then, a hot, stifling and choking heat that ate every word Stiles tried to say so he was left gasping. 

“Y’know…for all I say, I don’t think you’re a bad alpha or whatever. You know that right?” 

Derek’s fingers tensed over his thighs and for a second Stiles almost felt guilty about trying to comfort him. “Thank you, but your opinion doesn’t exactly rank high on my list,” Derek gritted out, and Stiles nearly threw out a cutting remark in response, but managed to bite it down. 

“Just trying to help,” Stiles grumbled.

The “well don’t” hung heavy in the air, even if Derek didn’t physically say it.

Thankfully Deaton came out of the backroom moments later to break the odd moment, drying his hands with a white towel. 

“It’s been a while, hasn’t it,” Deaton said in way of a greeting, an enigmatic smile on his face. “Go ahead and remove your shirt, Stiles, and sit on the examination table while I get ready.” 

Deaton disappeared the storage room and Stiles grudgingly got up and did as Deaton said. He returned with a box containing at least twelve different jars of dirt and set it on the table beside Stiles.

“Derek, the mind is such a fragile thing,” Deaton said as he pressed a pinch of some reddish looking dirt to the fleshy part of Stiles’ forearm. 

Stiles couldn’t see Derek from where he was, but he heard a heavy sigh and some shifting. 

“Sometimes I get animals in here suffering from signs of neglect,” he continued, removing the lid to the next jar. “They were isolated and most were barely fed enough to live day to day, if even that, and it wreaks havoc on their mental states.” 

“So you’re saying that…” Derek began quietly, voice breaking mid-sentence.

“Yes, that Erica and Boyd look just like that.”

Derek sighed and Stiles pictured him with his elbows on his knees and his face in his palms, rubbing his eyes. It what his dad always did when he sounded like that. 

“I believe the Alpha Pack’s aim was to keep them out of the equation, keep them from being reliable pack members for you.“

Stiles was quite frankly pretty surprised Derek hadn’t gone all alpha-male again and told Deaton to save it ‘til Stiles was out and in the Camaro again. Did that mean that Derek finally trusted Stiles enough? Or what? 

“But _why_?” Derek asked, voice muffled.

“I wonder.”

Derek groaned and Stiles nearly started laughing because holy shit, Deaton was even more of a mysterious asshole to Derek than he was to Scott. There was no doubt in Stiles mind that Scott would kick out of that.

“So what do I do?” Derek asked, and there were some shuffling noises like he was rearranging himself in his seat. 

Deaton sighed and put away another jar. “I’d suggest talking to them and seeing what they want to do. If I was sure they could control their shift, I’d tell you to report them as found and let their families and the hospital take care of them, but you’re pack, their alpha. Let them know you care.”

Derek was silent, and Deaton continued his seemingly random dirt and hoodoo bone placement thing on Stiles. With the lack of conversation Stiles noticed the subtle changes in Deaton’s demeanor while he worked. The slight pinched look in one corner of his mouth, the way the laugh lines smoothed out around his eyes. He was frustrated with something, and Stiles would be lying if that didn’t make him nervous. 

“Odd,” Deaton said, setting down his instruments and closing the last jar of dirt. 

Stiles shot him an inquisitive look instead of using his words. 

“There’s been no change in energy level since the last time you were here.” 

Stiles tightened his grip on the edge of the table. “What does that even mean?” he cried out. 

“You may never run out of energy.”

He might not die for real? No eating, or drinking, or finding pleasure anything? Just existing? That scared him just as much as possibly finding out he might die in a matter of months. Too much time or not nearly enough.

* * *

Erica and Boyd were sleeping in the back room when Stiles and Derek finally came back, and they had the good sense not to wake them. They’d been through a lot, hell Stiles felt drained and he’d only experienced what they had for five days. It was odd seeing them so… _broken_. They probably thought themselves as such before they became werewolves, the kind of broken only a bite and some smooth words can fix, but now they might have regretted it. Maybe Stiles had made the right choice in refusing the bite from Peter, no matter how bad he wanted it. To be special, cool, liked.

When they awoke Derek kicked Stiles out of the room, but he was pretty much expecting that. Getting to hear Derek and Deaton’s conversation was enough of a win for the day. Deaton was nice enough to give Stiles some ace bandages for his wrists while he waited. 

In the end Erica decided to get therapy, at the very least to cope with the loss of her ear, and Deaton wrote out a list of people Derek could contact in the area that were well aware of werewolves. Boyd didn’t talk so they decided therapy would be best as well.

* * *

The sun was only just starting to set over Stiles’ neighborhood, the hustle and bustle of kids outside playing and parents doing whatever it was parents did only just dying down. Stiles was kind of hoping that his dad had the late shift at the station, but he could see both cars in the driveway from down the street where Derek had parked the Camaro so he clearly wasn’t. His jeep was closer to the bottom though, and that made Stiles’ stomach fall. His dad was using his jeep instead of his own car and _shit_ , his dad missed the hell out of him and—

Derek squeezed Stiles’ shoulder firmly, pulling him out of his thoughts, and _God_ , he hadn’t even felt Derek put it there in the first place. It seemed like a pretty hard thing to miss too now that he was aware of the solid heat through his borrowed t-shirt. 

“You’re freaking out,” Derek said evenly, pulling his hand back. He was putting on an air of calmness but Stiles could see the line of his shoulders and how forced his position in his seat was. 

Stiles groaned and dropped his head forward to rest in his hands.

“Jesus, could you keep your freaky werewolf hearing to yourself for like, _one_ second. My heartbeat is none of your fucking business.” 

Derek didn’t answer and when Stiles removed his hands and looked over, Derek was simply raising and eyebrow at him. Oh that’s right. Stiles almost wanted to laugh in frustration because he’d somehow _forgotten_ and he didn’t even think that was possible. Derek wasn’t listening to his heartbeat because Stiles didn’t have a heartbeat for him to listen to.

Stiles collapsed back against his seat and turned his gaze back to his house. 

“That bad, huh?” he asked when he’d finally found his voice again. 

“Kinda,” Derek said, and when Stiles looked over he was pulling a face like he expected Stiles to hit him. 

“Stop making that face, it makes you look constipated,” Stiles muttered and leaned against the window beside him. Derek turned off the Camaro, and from what Stiles could hear from his position, leaned back into his seat. He didn’t bother to check and see if Derek actually had stopped doing his weird face thing.

There were three lights on in his house that he could see from where he was: his room, the living room, and the kitchen. His dad could be in any of those rooms no problem on a Friday night now that Stiles wasn’t there to keep him out of his room, and that scared the hell out of him because that was visual proof that his dad missed him. The last time his dad had been in his room constantly was when his mom died because Stiles had nightmares on and off and his dad was lonely enough to insist on staying there to make sure none happened every night. The thought of his dad doing that now to mourn _him_ made him feel like he’d just swallowed gallons of acid.

“I don’t know if I can actually do this,” Stiles said, but the words felt heavy in his mouth. 

“Why?” Derek asked, and it was an innocent enough question that it shouldn’t have bothered Stiles, but it did. 

Because Stiles didn’t know _why_. He had so many chances to tell his dad about werewolves and the dangerous shit they got up to in order to keep dumb teenagers in Beacon Hills safe, but he didn’t. He lied every time and now his first instinct was to continue to lie. It scared him. Stiles had the chance to say it for sure, but he couldn’t because he was dead and he was scared about how his dad would react. Sure, the guy was level headed enough when presented with facts, but finding out that Stiles was most likely dead from the supernatural business and that he kept all of this secret would probably send him in a rage. Or worse. Disappoint him. 

“What’s he doing?” Stiles asked because he was apparently a glutton for punishment. 

Derek sighed in exasperation, but Stiles ignored it. His focus was completely on his bedroom window. 

“The game’s on. A rerun of something but I can’t tell what.” 

Pretty usual then. Stiles came downstairs to find his dad engrossed in the sport of the day a lot when his dad was off. He tried not to think about the times he broke down crying early after his mom’s death because she had actually been the sports watcher of the family, not that he or his dad couldn’t appreciate a good game. 

“Footsteps so he’s moving. An old floorboard creaked. Going upstairs maybe?” 

The kitchen light shut off but the living room remained on. Stiles watched for his dad’s bedroom light to go on just in case he actually was going upstairs, but it didn’t. Instead a shadow flickered across Stiles’ bedroom window and his heart sunk. 

“I hear liquid swishing and some quiet mutterings. I think—“ 

“Stop,” Stiles interrupted, and his voice sounded really choked up for it belonging to someone dead. 

His dad was drinking alone in Stiles’ room and Jesus he really couldn’t drop any of the werewolf shit on him. It would break his heart. 

Stiles sat still for another minute or so, watching the shadows flicker across the visible wall through his window. 

“We can leave, if you want,” Derek offered after a while, and Stiles heard the keys shift in the ignition. “Come back when you’re ready.” 

That was doable. Maybe. It made Stiles feel better, anyway, even if he wasn’t sure if he’d ever be ready. 

“Okay,” Stiles said, and the Camaro started up.

* * *

Isaac, Erica, and Boyd were all curled up together in the living room on a king sized mattress Derek pulled out from somewhere when they got back to the Hale house. It was kind of weird looking, like some sort of puppy pile that didn’t end in pain or broken bones like it had when he and Scott were in middle school. Derek must have caught him pulling a funny face at it because his lips tightened and he muttered something about Deaton recommending it. 

They walked up to Derek’s room and Stiles asked if Derek was supposed to be joining Isaac, Erica, and Boyd downstairs, but Derek shook his head no. He pulled out a pair of leather handcuffs and directed Stiles to the bed instead. And okay, that was weird. 

“What are the handcuffs for?” he asked, kicking off his shoes. 

“You still walking at night?” 

Oh. That. 

“Erica said I was eating dirt or something,” Stiles said, almost protesting, but he sat on the bed anyway. “But yeah I am.” 

Derek squinted at him in a face that Stiles thought was probably confusion, but looked more like he needed to take a big shit. “Then lay back and I’ll cuff you to the bed.” 

“Kinky,” Stiles said, though he couldn’t bring himself to be serious about the delivery. He stretched back across the bed and held his arms next to the headboard so Derek could buckle him in. And great, his back already started to pull. It was going to be a long, sleepless night regardless of whether or not he actually slept. 

Derek smirked as he leaned over, chest at Stiles’ eyelevel, and hooked the handcuffs on the headboard before doing them up over the ace bandages on Stiles’ wrists. “I’ve got a matching whip in the closet,” he murmured over Stiles, his breath coming in hot puff against Stiles’ head. 

And oh, _Jesus_ , if Stiles was still alive he’d have the boner of the century right then. Totally unable to blush because all the blood would be rushing south. He’s pretty sure no one would blame him if he started sputtering because Derek’s unfairly firm, developed chest was staring him in the face and he was handcuffing Stiles to the bed. Boner city, in other words, but Stiles was completely indifferent to it. If Deaton was right and Stiles wouldn’t die…he isn’t sure he’d be able to live without the ability to jerk off or whatever. He’d be cursed to be a virgin literally forever.

Derek squeezed Stiles’ wrist underneath the cuff and pulled away, the heat practically searing Stiles through the ace bandage. “In all seriousness though, we used those guys for the preteen werewolves during their shifts so unless you somehow gain supernatural strength overnight, they’ll hold you.” 

“Are you saying I have preteen wrists?” 

“If the shoe fits,” Derek said, but it came out muffled, like he was trying to speak through layers of cloth. When Stiles twisted his body to see Derek was tossing his shirt across the room. Oh. 

Stiles watched him strip his jeans off and flip off the lamp before crawling into bed next to him with an air of disinterest. His eyes were still on him when Derek curled towards Stiles, froze, then flipped over so his back was to Stiles, and then rolling once more so his face was straight up. 

Derek sighed and ran his hands over his face. “I know you don’t want to talk about it, but I think you should tell your dad.” 

“I’m surprised _you_ want to talk about it,” Stiles said instead of actually contributing to the topic. 

“Don’t change the subject. This is different.” 

If Stiles laughed a little too loud at that Derek didn’t say anything, because _yeah_ fucking _right_. It wasn’t different at all. 

“And what’s it matter to _you_ , Derek,” Stiles goaded, and no no that’s not what he wanted to say at all, but the words flew out of his mouth anyway. 

“Maybe I just don’t want your dad to end up like me, you ever think of that?” 

Ah! And there it was. The reason why Derek was weirdly invested. 

“How so? A crazy psycho didn’t burn _his_ family alive.” 

Stiles didn’t care if he was pushing buttons that didn’t need to be pushed. He was done with the conversation because the fact of the matter was that at that point in time he was not going to tell his dad. 

The reaction was almost instant. Derek rolled over with a flourish and went to grab Stiles’ _neck_ or whatever, but stopped and let his hand fall to the bed between them. The anger in no way flew out of his body, but Derek did visibly relax. 

“I just think your dad will want to see you, regardless of whatever news you bring.” 

“And how would you know that?”

“Because more than anything, _I’d_ kill to see my family again,” he burst out, and Stiles was taken aback at the passion in his voice. “Even if they were technically dead and going to die who knows when for real,” he added, softer.

Any emotion in Stiles drained at that. The sink that had been plugged and full was empty just like that.

Derek stiffly rolled over onto his side so his back was to Stiles, and Stiles was pretty sure he might have just hurt his feelings. It was a weird thought because it was _Derek_ , but Stiles couldn’t think of anything else. Despite how high and mighty he acted at times, Derek didn’t make his bed, liked ham and cheese breakfast sandwiches from McDonalds, and missed his family more than he let on. He was more human than Stiles was, at least when Stiles was dead anyway. 

“Do you miss them?” Stiles found himself asking, eyes tracing the lines of Derek’s form because his hands couldn’t. 

“Of course,” Derek eventually grumbled, though his arm muffled his voice. 

“Why have you been thinking about this so much?” Stiles asked, and wow he should stop while he was ahead. Derek grunted instead of answering, which was about what Stiles expected. 

“C’mon…the sharing circle deal, remember?” 

“I’m pretty sure this has nothing to do with people being in danger.” 

“I’m pretty sure your face will be in danger if you don’t answer.” 

Derek snorted and shifted his position on the bed, though he remained turned away from Stiles’ prying eyes.

“I’ve just…been having dreams about them lately. About my mom and stuff and I dunno, I’d just like to see them for real.” 

“Oh,” Stiles said, and he was pretty sure he should stop there before he had an upset Derek on his tail. It was weird, but Stiles thought Derek maybe trusted him? He couldn’t see why else Derek would share that information, but who knows. Maybe he was just caught up in the moment because Stiles had a little bit of an emotional moment earlier and they were sharing a bed in the dark. 

“My turn then,” Stiles started, trailing off when he couldn’t think of anything serious that wasn’t about his dad. “Uhhhh, I’m bisexual?” he blurted and cringed when it reached his own ears. “I mean, I am but I haven’t told anyone even though I’m pretty sure Scott already knows and wow okay. Yeah.” 

“That’s not a secret,” Derek said, and Stiles froze. Stiles had never tried particularly hard to make sure he wasn’t thinking about sex with Derek around Derek, but he didn’t think his attraction to dudes was _that_ obvious. 

And he was about to say something in his defense that would probably come out awkward when he realized that, oh, Derek was just repeating what Stiles had said at Deaton’s office that time. “Sorry if I didn’t have anything as exciting as losing my virginity at some time considering I’m still holding my V-card,” he mumbled, and he was pretty sure he saw Derek’s shoulders shake in laughter. The ass. 

Neither of them said anything for a while and Derek’s laughter eventually died down, not that Stiles thought his dumb-ass comments were worth _that_ much laughter. Even Scott didn’t laugh that much. Derek was probably pretty close to sleep when Stiles spoke up again.

“You know…with Boyd and Erica most likely out of the picture, you’re still missing a lot of pack to have any chance against the Alpha Pack.” 

Derek was silent, but Stiles could tell he wasn’t sleeping so he continued on. 

“I could help you get Jackson on your side tomorrow, or any time I guess, but I figure earlier is probably better.” 

The planes of Derek’s back went rigid with Stiles’ words and Stiles didn’t know how to interpret it. Was it an “I-can’t-believe-this-idiot-is-talking” muscle tense or something more along the lines of “I-can’t-believe-someone-wants-to-help-me” thing? But he guessed it didn’t matter.

“Not Scott?” Derek asked, and his voice with tight with an emotion Stiles couldn’t name. 

If the Alphas could manage to have a leader with no problem like Beefcakes said, then maybe he could ask Scott to join. There’s no way he’d ask Scott to compromise when Derek was just as bad at ideas sometimes too. And if there were any way to kick the Alphas out without Derek having to turn more teenagers in order to do so, Scott would probably be for it. 

“Maybe,” he muttered, and that was that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I definitely didn't plan to take that long to get this chapter out, haha. Good news is that the climax should hit next chapter so you guys will see why Stiles is the way he is. I've left a lot of clues so I'm actually pretty curious whether or not anyone's figured it out, haha. 
> 
> On another note, the kink meme I started this on has closed so I will no longer be updating there. Pretty strictly ao3 now. And in case anyone didn't know, there's a new kink meme [here](http://tnw-kinkmeme.livejournal.com/). :] 
> 
> Happy super bowl everyone! I mean I'm mostly into it for the food, whoops.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhhh. sorry! one of these scenes gave me a lot of trouble, and then I started obsessing over hockey, and well, here we are, haha.

“Remind me again why I’m going in for another check-up when we already know that I apparently can’t die?” 

The vet’s office was empty as far as customers go, and yet there were still dogs and cats moving around or barking in their kennels down the hall. Sometimes Stiles wondered how Deaton and Scott made any money with all the werewolf shenanigans forcing Deaton to close up shop at random times. Maybe he had some weird animal trade business on the side because Stiles wasn’t sure he’d seen a customer in the Animal Clinic since Scott got bitten.

“Because,” Derek said through a mouthful of food, his body spread out on the sole chair in the room with one of his war books propped open in one hand and a breakfast sandwich in the other.

“No one ever tell you not to talk with your mouth full? God, were you raised by _wolves_?” 

Derek lazily pulled his eyes off his book and pointedly rolled them at Stiles. “You’ve been holding onto that one for a while, haven’t you?”

Stiles leaned back on the examination table, resting on his palms, and sneered at Derek, but Derek had turned back to his book before the look could properly reach him. Asshole.

Deaton came into the room carrying his big box of dirt and bones, and Stiles kept himself from saying what he wanted to Derek, which likely would’ve been a mouthful of strange vowels and a badly put together comeback if he was being honest so maybe he should have been thanking Deaton for his arrival. 

“To be fair you can still die, just not from your energy running out, so your assumption about your immortality is incorrect,” Deaton said as he put the box down next to Stiles on the table. 

“So my choices are living dead forever, getting nailed in a supernatural accident, or a supernatural suicide, _awesome_ ,” Stiles said sarcastically, throwing a look at Derek, who was trying too hard to look interested in his book, sandwich finished. 

He seriously hoped there was a different option because all three were rather unappetizing. Hell, he just wished he died like a normal person if he was going to die then anyway. Less stress about his dad, Scott, and the strange friendship he and Derek seemed to be striking up that way because he simply wouldn’t exist. But Jesus, that was depressing. 

“Essentially yes,” Deaton said as he opened a jar of dirt, clearly not picking up on the fact that that was definitely not what Stiles wanted to hear.

Deaton started doing his thing and Stiles relaxed into the mindlessness of it. Dirt went on, (hopefully chicken) bones touched the dirt, Deaton stared at it, and repeat.

“So Derek, what have Erica and Boyd decided?” Deaton asked when they were maybe halfway done with his usual bone and dirt routine, and Stiles angled his head to get a clear view of Derek out of curiosity. 

Derek lifted his head and shrugged a little too hard for it to be as nonchalant as he wanted it to be. “Isaac and Peter are bringing them around to the names you mentioned tomorrow to see who they like better.”

“Ah,” Deaton said, and he rubbed a bit of clay looking stuff under Stiles’ nose. “Why not you?” 

Derek shifted in his seat and made a half aborted move to bring his book up to pretend to be reading. If Stiles didn’t know any better he would say Derek was uncomfortable with Stiles in the room again, but he did know better and he knew Derek was uncomfortable with _himself_ in the room. He felt unworthy, inadequate maybe, and Stiles would have tried to say something to pull the focus away from that if Derek hadn’t already started to speak. 

“I’m busy…with-“ he made a jilted hand gesture in the general area of Stiles, “-and the Alphas.” Derek’s shoulders hunched forward, making himself shrink in his chair. 

“I see,” Deaton said and Stiles could tell even he didn’t believe the excuse. 

The air in the room became hot and stifling under all the words none of them were saying and even Stiles could feel the temperature change. The elephant in the room was just going to remain there then, even if it became increasingly hard to miss as the seconds ticked by. 

Well, if Derek could use him as an excuse not to spend time with Erica and Boyd, Stiles could use Derek to break the weird silence, though Derek was ultimately going to get the short end of the stick with what the first thing that popped into Stiles’ head was. 

“Why Derek,” Stiles began, trying his best to mimic the sort of voice swooning ladies in western films had. “I thought you didn’t care about me, but putting off your whole pack to spend time with me? Could give a person some ideas, you know.” 

Derek was completely unimpressed, as expected, but Stiles caught Deaton biting down a small smile so he counted that as a win somewhere along the line. He was silent, Derek’s mouth gaping enough that Stiles knew he was grasping at words, but his bitch face was pretty much frozen so he must have been running through his mental repertoire of sassy comebacks to choose the one that would deliver the maximum burn. Too bad for Derek the silence part that came before it minimized the effectiveness.

“Yeah, that you’re _delusi_ —“ 

A techno pop song filtered through the room, freezing Derek mid-word and cutting off Derek’s exceptionally bad comeback. Deaton paused in his work to look curiously at Derek, who was doing some intense acrobatic feats just to shove his hand in his pocket and drag his phone out. Why even wear pants tight enough that even Stiles’ dead balls crawled up in his body at the thought of donning them, and expect them to be functional? Seriously.

“It’s Scott,” Derek said after he pulled it out, brows pinched in confusion because Scott never called Derek, not unless he had to anyway. There was no way this conversation was going to be anything good, then.

He flipped the phone open and pressed to his ear, wincing when the call connected. “Yeah?” he said, and Scott’s voice came in so loud that Stiles could hear his muffled and frantic tone across the room. 

Derek pointedly moved the phone about six inches away from his ear and pinched the point where his brows met his nose. “Scott, I can’t understand you. We’re at the animal clinic so just meet us here if you need to talk.” 

Derek shut the phone with a snap and slid it into his pocket. Stiles didn’t know why Derek would tell him to come to the animal clinic, but man he was thankful. He’d get to see Scott, Stiles would find out why Scott was so upset without having to get it from Derek, and…oh hell he hoped Derek didn’t expect Stiles to try and work Scott into being okay with the whole “hey so you should join Derek’s pack” thing _already._

“What’s up?” Stiles asked, almost reluctant to hear the answer.

“I don’t know,” Derek sighed, putting his face in his hands. “I heard something about Allison or whatever before I told him to come here.”

Ordinarily Stiles would have brushed it off a bit because he was pretty well acquainted with Scott’s tendency to overreact when Allison was involved, but _holy God_. She had rescued Stiles, Erica, and Boyd from the Alphas the day before and they most definitely would be after revenge. Dread ate at his stomach, but Derek didn’t seem to notice Stiles’ change in attitude. Judging by the look Deaton gave him, he noticed, but he didn’t say anything. 

Ten minutes later, Scott burst through the doors and wasted no time in telling them that the Alphas had gone after Allison, and Stiles stomach officially exploded with the worst feeling that had probably ever taken residence there. 

God. Jesus. Fuck. It was completely his fault. 

“What?” Stiles squeezed out, and Scott just sort of let himself fall in a sitting position on the floor next to Derek, who looked unsure of himself. 

“It’s insane, right?” Scott mumbled, pushing his face into his trembling hands. If he hadn’t already been sitting on Deaton’s examination table for an hour, Stiles might have run over to him to hug or something, but he didn’t know if it would mess up the dirt thing. He tried to convey his meaning to Derek, who was easily in a position to comfort, but Derek responded with a shrug and a panicked look. 

“The alpha jumped her at her house, but I couldn’t go in and…” Scott made a frustrated noise and rubbed his hands through his hair furiously. “I think she hates me,” he muttered to the floor.

“Did they take her?” Stiles asked, gripping the edge of the table as hard as he could. 

Scott picked his head up and looked Stiles in the eyes. “No, of course not. She and her dad killed him.” 

“Oh,” Stiles breathed out, all the panic and worry leaving his body like someone had poked a hole in his balloon. She wasn’t hurt or in any immediate danger, in fact she had apparently helped them by killing one of them. Stiles didn’t feel any different knowing one was dead. He mostly felt…knowledgeable, if he was being honest. Assuming there were only the five alphas he had seen, Beefcakes or Elliot was dead.

“Yeah, she sent an arrow through the guy’s eyeball and her dad finished it up by chopping him in half,” Scott said and Stiles winced at the image. Sure they were little turds, especially for neglecting Erica and Boyd, but that was just _grotesque_. “I just want to keep her safe, protect her, y’know? I mean what if the alpha pack comes after her again? But how can I do that when she won’t let me?” 

Scott pulled his knees against his chest and sunk his face behind them. 

Derek gave Stiles a look, pleading with him, but it wasn’t time to bring it up yet. Stiles couldn’t talk about joining up with Derek as one pack when Scott was…worried about Allison, which would likely be a constant but that wasn’t the point. It just wasn’t time yet, even if Stiles was well aware that that was just an excuse because no time would ever be the right time.

“Scott…you just described how she sent a wolfsbane laced arrow through a guy’s eye, and your aim is to make her let you _keep her safe_?” Stiles said instead, pulling his eyes away from Derek before he could see any kind of disappointment on his face.

“I didn’t say they were wolfsbane,” Scott said, his voice muffled by his knees. He pulled his head out from his body-made cave and rested it on top of his knees. “But yeah, dude, I can’t let her get hurt. I’m just…worried they’ll come after her again. I don’t think I can deal with her not being safe.” 

Stiles bit his lip, unsure of what to say. Reassuring Scott would be the best friend thing to do, but Stiles wasn’t one hundred percent sure two humans, even if they did have a house chockfull of anti-werewolf things, could take on the Alphas if they decided to attack all at once. 

Deaton set a jar down on the table next to Stiles, breaking his silence, and sent Scott a smile. “You’re ten minutes early for work and it is advised that you go ahead and punch in.” 

Scott frowned, but stood up anyway with a grunt. “Oh, yeah. Can I get out ten minutes early tonight then?” 

“You’re closing.”

Scott groaned and turned towards Stiles as he walked towards the room entrance. “Bro you gotta help me out with Allison though. I’d give you a hug or the broshake, but dude, I don’t want to mess up Deaton’s artwork.” 

“Sure thing,” Stiles said and gave him a half assed salute. Scott grinned and returned the gesture before stepping out. 

Once Scott was out of the room, Deaton sighed and set the last jar on the table. That couldn’t have been a good sound, but why make Scott leave in order to say the bad news? It wasn’t like Scott couldn’t hear it anyway if he chose to listen in, but maybe it was just the illusion of privacy that Deaton wanted. 

“You’ve lost a tremendous amount of energy overnight. At this rate…you have approximately a month left.” 

Derek spoke before the words even properly registered in Stiles’ head. “What? But how…why would he lose that much energy after not losing any for several days?”

It felt like Stiles had gone underwater, sound hitting his ears but his brain unable to comprehend and turn the noises into actual words. Deaton replied to Derek, but Stiles couldn’t hear it, couldn’t even really see it. His mind was going in reverse. 

It shouldn’t have been a relief to him to hear that he was finally going to die for real, but it was. Was that was his mom felt like in her last stretch? Finally hearing the news and just accepting it? Planning? Stiles had a month to go, and Derek had less than that with the alpha stuff. He wasn’t entirely sure what Scott was up to with the Kanima, but the Alphas were involved in that too so it wasn’t like it’d be a totally different. He could help that, finish it as a last hurrah and leave on a good note. 

But his Dad, oh Jesus his dad. He couldn’t—he would just wait. 

There was warmth at his shoulder and Stiles focused in on it, realized it was Derek’s hand and that Derek was maybe a foot from his face asking a question. 

“What?” Stiles asked, and the hand pulled away. He tried his best not to move towards the retreating warmth as Derek stood up fully and out of his space.

Derek snorted and ran a frustrated hand through his hair. “I _said_ , did you do anything last night that you didn’t do before?” 

“What like ‘sleep’ on a bed instead of the hole they threw me and Erica and Boyd down in?”

“Don’t be sarcastic. Just answer the—the handcuffs. It was the handcuffs.”

Deaton paused in his cleaning and Stiles blinked slowly. 

“The handcuffs…? Oh! Oh right, I didn’t get up.”

“Sounds like you boys got up to something last night,” Deaton said, drying his freshly washed hands with a small white hand towel. “What’s this about getting up?” 

Stiles shrugged and leaned back on his hands. “Apparently I kept getting up whenever everyone slept. To eat dirt according to Erica, but uh, she’s been down in that hole so long she’s probably a bit… _whoo-hoo_ , y’know? So Derek handcuffed me to his bed.”

“Interesting,” Deaton said, placing his hand on his chin and leaning back against the counter. “Tell me, Stiles, are you familiar with the works of Edward Cutterly?”

Stiles let himself fall fully back against the examination table. The name sounded familiar, but he couldn’t grasp from where. If he had his phone, maybe he could look it up enough to jerk something out of his brain. “No I…can’t say that I do,” Stiles said slowly, unable to gauge Deaton’s expression. 

Derek shot him a pinched look. “You are. I saw you reading one at my house.” 

What? That couldn’t be right because the only books Stiles even touched at Derek’s house were war or poem books because that was all that was there. Unless… “You mean those dumb _poem books_?”

Derek frowned and crossed his arms over his chest. “Those were my mom’s favorite,” he said, defensive.

“Oh sorry but I don’t care,” Stiles said exasperatedly and the tips of Derek’s mouth went further south. “Deaton, you can’t honestly think that the point-oh-five seconds I looked at one of those books I saw that I could keep myself going forever off of eating _dirt_ , do you?”

Deaton shrugged. “I wouldn’t bet on it, but the mind is a curious thing.”

Stiles buried his face in his hands and groaned. “Oh my God, but not _my_ brain.” 

He couldn’t see anyone’s reactions through his fingers, but he assumed it was Derek and not Deaton who snorted before Scott called out from whatever room he was in, saying that Stiles’ brain was totally that weird. Stiles told him to shut up and keep shoveling dog poop in response, and Scott only laughed, the ass. 

Despite what Deaton and Derek thought, he had no idea he was doing it or _how_ he was doing it, so he was only alive as long as his subconscious kept it up. He could choose to keep himself handcuffed at night, but if he chose not to one night would that mean an entire month of waiting again? And what if _whatever_ part of himself was eating dirt at night just stopped?

* * *

Stiles was expecting a silent car ride back to the house, especially since Derek had acted kind of pissy since he insulted his mom’s taste in books (But poems? And god-awful dirt-eating poems at that? C’mon no one could blame him), but Derek apparently had other plans.

“When are you going to try and get Scott to join me?” he said as he pulled out of the animal clinic’s parking lot. “We need him if we’re going to drive the alpha pack out.”

Stiles sunk in his seat a little bit, slowly though so Derek wouldn’t notice out of the corner of his eyes, and glanced out the window. He expected the conversation would come at some point, not that he was particularly thrilled about that, and he should’ve known that Derek would bring it up when Stiles had no possible chance of running away. Well. He _could_ jump out the moving vehicle, but that would probably be worse than answering. Probably.

“After we get Jackson to join,” Stiles ended up saying in lieu of an actual answer. He didn’t have a reason for why having Jackson join first would be better, but it was an easier task on his heart at least.

* * *

“I’m just going to warn you that stakeouts can be kind of boring,” Stiles said as Derek eased down Jackson’s street in Peter’s car (the Camaro was a little _too_ recognizable).

Derek snorted and backed the car into Isaac’s old apartment drive, which was still empty after news of Isaac’s dad’s gruesome death and the rumors about Isaac spread around Beacon Hills. No one wanted to live there after that, which Stiles was a little bit in agreement with even if the idea of seeing a ghost was so awesomely cool. 

“I can’t believe you forgot the doughnuts and coffee, man. You can’t have a stakeout without doughnuts and coffee.” 

Derek tossed him the canister of cocoa covered almonds that he brought for sustenance, and Stiles frowned at it before setting it on the center console. He wasn’t hungry, but it was the principle of the thing. Every movie, and hell even his dad’s old partner back when he was a deputy, told him that stakeouts meant stuffing your face with fried, sugary goodness and chugging coffee like your life depended on it. 

“Speaking of, why _are_ we staking out Jackson’s house?” Derek asked. 

“The sarcasm’s totally unnecessary, man. You gotta get real intimate with your enemy’s surroundings before striking. We need blackmail or something to force him in. Or Lydia, but I don’t have the kind of power needed to sway her.” 

“Ah,” Derek said, and when Stiles looked over at him his eyebrows were a full inch and a half above his eyes and his mouth was open in a disbelieving ‘o’. He looked like he was going to sneeze, but Stiles kept his mouth shut about that. 

“And I thought that’s what we _weren’t_ supposed to be doing? I was called a bad alpha by you for even suggesting it.”

“Tone, dude, watch it. But this is Jackson and that was Scott. Jackson’s a poophead and Scott’s not. The math’s simple. Now keep those pretty little hazel eyes on Jackson’s house. I think his room is the top left.” 

Stiles propped his feet up on the dash in some half-assed attempt to get comfortable and Derek pulled the key out of the ignition. The Whittemore house was smaller than Stiles thought; a little more large upper middle class family and less I bought my son a Porsche for his first car. It was nice though; the kind of house Stiles pictured living in with his future significant other (always Lydia after fifth grade but lately it was some faceless Lydia shape that mostly made his heart hurt) and two-point-five kids, but that thought mostly put a sour taste in his mouth. A month wasn’t really enough time to do any of that stuff, even if he weren’t dead.

Derek sighed next to him and cracked the lid to the almonds open, which made Stiles smirk into the passenger window. It hadn’t been more than two or three minutes and Derek was already getting bored enough to snack. 

“I can’t hear anything in the house,” Derek said around a mouthful of almonds and Stiles barely bit his tongue in time to stop himself from making another crack at Derek’s manners, not that his were any better really. 

“Well you wouldn’t. Not with the way you’ve been crunching on those things.” 

Derek shot him an annoyed look and briefly looked like he was considering throwing an almond or two at Stiles before he ultimately put it in his mouth. “I just meant that I don’t think anyone’s home,” he said after he swallowed. 

Stiles shrugged. There was a light or two on upstairs and Jackson’s car was still in the driveway so maybe he was sleeping and Derek couldn’t discern those noises from the rest of the neighborhood. 

An hour or two passed before either of them spoke again. Derek had finished off his almonds and set the empty container on the floor about halfway through and fidgeted in his seat after. Stiles never would’ve guessed he was one of those people. He always seemed so much calmer than Stiles and Scott, who definitely were the sort people who couldn’t sit still in silence for more than a pitiful handful of minutes. 

“I think you’re right,” Stiles mumbled after another five minutes passed without any sign of life in the house. 

“I’m always right,” was the immediate response and Stiles turned to him with an eyebrow raised, but Derek was looking off at the house, absentmindedly scratching his stomach through his wife beater. 

“I mean, I don’t think anyone’s home,” Stiles said, exasperated. 

Derek looked at him this time, a small grin playing on his face and his hand stilling on his stomach. “I told you that an hour and a half ago. Had to check with your own senses first, you ass?” 

That pun better had been unintended, and considering Stiles’ assumptions about Derek’s humor and intelligence, it definitely was. “Sorry, some of aren’t werewolves, and besides, we have the view of the front of the house. If we’d thought this through we would’ve split up with walky-talkies and taken at least two sides.”

“If you were a werewolf we would’ve left an hour ago because you would’ve known there was no one in the house.” He had a teasing lilt to his voice and that was still pretty foreign to Stiles’ ears. If he’d known any better he’d say it was almost flirting, but that was even more ridiculous than Derek being friendly. It just didn’t happen. 

He was going to make a comment about having real food instead of _nuts_ on the stakeout if he’d been a werewolf, but the moment passed so he looked down at his knees and picked at his borrowed jeans. “I could’ve been a werewolf, y’know,” he ended up saying, quietly. It sounded weird after all the pseudo-maybe-flirting conversation.

“What? You ask Scott for the bite?” Derek’s tone of voice was still light, so whatever weirdness in Stiles was completely overlooked or purposefully ignored. Whichever. 

“No. Peter.” 

Honesty hadn’t really been the choice his brain made for a response, but his mouth was a little faster apparently. He meant to go for something biting, like saying Scott would never turn anyone into a werewolf, or questioning like asking whether or not Scott could actually do that because that would be _awesome_.

“What?” When Stiles turned back towards him Derek’s grin had dropped off his face to make way for his stupid pinched confusion face. He couldn’t look at that so he planted his gaze back on the Whittemore house. 

“The night of the winter formal. When he attacked Lydia. He, uh, offered me the bite later.” 

“And he tricked you or something? He didn’t mean it?” 

“No—I don’t know. I didn’t take the bite; I said no.” 

But man had he wanted to. Scott became first line, grew all those muscles, got the girl and got to kiss the girl Stiles wanted. Stiles would be lying through his teeth if he tried to say he didn’t want all that, but he didn’t know. Scott hated being a werewolf, hated that it was forced on him, and Stiles wasn’t sure if he could do that to his friend. And he ended up saying “no” when every fiber of his being wanted to say “yes.”

“Oh,” Derek muttered, disbelieving, and Stiles didn’t have anything to add.

The only thing Stiles could see in his peripherals was Derek’s white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. He thought about poking fun at it since the keys weren’t even in the ignition, but that would require looking at him and Stiles wasn’t totally up for that. 

“I’m glad you didn’t,” Derek breathed out, and his hands disappeared from Stiles’ view. When Stiles adjusted his gaze to the dashboard above the radio, he saw that Derek was twiddling his thumbs in his lap. 

“I’m surprised you care,” Stiles said, and Derek’s hands flung apart to grip the edges of his seat. 

“Of course I—why does everyone think I don’t care?” Derek grit out, frustrated, and one of his hands moved back to the wheel to squeeze at the faux leather. “I didn’t offer my help to Scott because I wanted him to get hurt; I didn’t _want_ you to die; I was trying my hardest to do what was right with Erica and Boyd, even if it was slow. I. I just…I care.” 

Stiles opened his mouth to say something, but he didn’t know what so his jaw hung stupidly open until he realized he was gaping and shut it with a snap. He could feel Derek’s gaze on his face, and his chest grew tight in response. Derek apparently cared, and all Stiles could think of was Derek’s face when he’d come in through the door after his visit to the Alpha Pack. He _missed_ Stiles, he guessed, and with all the maybe flirting he didn’t know what his feelings were doing. 

“Been holding onto that a while, huh?” Stiles said at Derek’s stupidly handsome cheek, unable to look him in the eye. He apparently _liked_ Derek, with a capital L, and he couldn’t do anything about it because he was dead. 

Derek made a noise in his throat, and it felt like he was about to say something but Stiles didn’t know that for sure because he was looking at the Whittemore house again. He didn’t remember consciously turning away from Derek, but apparently he had. 

It was in that moment that someone knocked on the window and Derek yelped and Stiles turned at the noise only to find Derek nervously rolling down the window where a disgruntled Jackson stood. Oh. 

“You two done talking about your feelings or are you going to keep me up another hour?” Jackson said as he rubbed his eyes. 

Derek turned towards Stiles to shoot him a questioning look and Stiles gave him a confused one back. “Yeah, uh, we’re just leaving,” Stiles said, eyes not leaving Derek’s. 

“Good,” Jackson grumbled, and shoved off where he was leaning against the car. “Smell you guys later, hopefully not in front of my house like a bunch of creeps.” 

Derek fumbled with his keys and shoved them into the ignition as Jackson walked back up to his house, and Stiles laughed nervously in his direction once the door shut behind him. 

“Where were your fancy werewolf senses then?” 

Derek chose to start the car instead of taking the bait and taunting back, and that was okay, Stiles supposed. He had a sense of pride and maybe admitting he cared about people and getting the bejeezus scared out of him by Jackson hurt it a little too much for conversation. Wimp.

* * *

Derek tensed up when they pulled into the Hale House driveway, but he was still doing his one-syllable unspeaking thing and Stiles didn’t really feel like trying to yank it out of him, so he fiddled with the empty McDonald’s bag at the floor by his feet they’d acquired when Derek decided that almonds weren’t enough to curb his hunger. 

It turned out he didn’t need to wait long to find out anyway. Allison was leaning against the wall by the door with a large black bag by her feet and Stiles didn’t need to guess what was in there. 

“What are you doing here,” Derek asked and Stiles nearly rolled his eyes. As if he didn’t remember the conversation they’d had with Scott that morning. 

Allison glanced between them and pushed off the wall to an upright position when her eyes finally settled on Derek. “Delivery,” she said and crouched down to unzip the body bag enough to show the face. 

It was Elliot, and Stiles was thankful the Argents had the sense to pull out the arrow and cover his eye with some gauze if what Scott said about Allison shooting him in the eye was true. But maybe they didn’t care to see the gore that came with their job either. 

Allison zipped it closed and stood up again, brushing the backs of her legs with her hands. “We thought he’d be of more use to you than us, and we’d rather the rest of the pack come to you rather than us to retrieve him, no offense.” 

“None taken,” Derek muttered darkly. 

It was quiet for a few uncomfortable moments as they sized each other up, and Stiles couldn’t bring himself to interrupt. His stomach ached in an odd way and he wasn’t one to go against a gut feeling. Allison was the first to pull away. 

“Well,” she said, “I’m off then.” She moved past Derek with a cautious step and brushed by Stiles as she walked down the stairs, leaving him oddly cold. 

“Wait!” Stiles called out, and Allison paused in her step. His gut felt heavy and cold and he didn’t know why, and it’s not like Allison would know why either, but he felt like he had to keep her there for at least another minute. “Um, that body bag looks heavy. How did you, uh, get it up there on the porch?” 

She snorted and tilted her head towards the house. “Isaac,” she said and Stiles didn’t stop her when she turned around and walked towards her car. It felt like he had snakes instead of organs and they didn’t stop squirming until she her car was out of sight. 

“You okay?” Derek asked and Stiles startled, noticing the way his fingers were curled tightly in the fabric above his stomach. One month. He forced his hand away and shot Derek a grin. 

“Uh, yeah. Just a bit chilly out, yeah?” 

Derek gave him an odd look but thankfully didn’t say anything, and directed them both towards the door.

They went to bed almost immediately, which wasn’t surprising once Stiles got a hold of a clock and saw it was close to two am, and Derek didn’t bother grabbing the handcuffs off the side table. Stiles didn’t ask, but it kind of made sense since he wasn’t exactly getting any more alive by wearing them, not that they made him any deader either.

* * *

Stiles was awake and aware the entire time Derek slept. In all his time as the living dead, he’d always drifted outside of his head, for lack of a better phrase, at least a little while during the night, which Stiles assumed was when he went out and ate dirt or whatever. Maybe knowing about it kept him from doing it, or something. He didn’t know. 

Mostly he spent the night staring up at the ceiling, then staring at Derek’s chest close up when Derek rolled over in his sleep and threw and arm over him. Stiles’ chest felt hot but every time he tried to wiggle free Derek tightened his grip on him and pulled him closer, so he ended up with his face smashed into the solid wall of Derek’s muscles and absorbed all the heat Derek gave off. If he closed his eyes he could pretend he was still warm bodied and alive and in a lover’s embrace, but that made his heart hurt so he kept his eyes open and glared hard at the skin in front of him, not that he could see much. 

They got up without a hassle and Derek didn’t say anything about their position before he made his way to the bathroom for a shower, leaving Stiles feeling kind of empty since he wanted a reaction of some sort, but he didn’t know why. 

The morning came and passed and it wasn’t until mid afternoon that Isaac had had enough of the rotting dead body still on their porch and they decided to take care of it. Just how they did was a mystery to Stiles, but Isaac and Derek came back an hour or so later with lunch and Peter in tow. 

Stiles expected Jackson to burst in at any moment and complain about Stiles and Derek stalking him the night before since that would be a very Jackson thing to do, but he didn’t. The door stayed shut and the conversations stayed stilted and mundane inside the house. 

It was a fairly boring and uneventful day, in other words—absolutely nothing like the days that had preceded it, and Stiles couldn’t tell if the feeling in the pit of his stomach was boredom or dread. 

Like most things in Beacon Hills since Scott had gotten bitten, it turned out to be dread. Isaac burst into the upstairs den where Derek, Stiles, and Peter had been playing random card games, though their choices were rather limited since three player card games weren’t always the fun ones, and said Allison was at the door for them. Stiles wouldn’t have been concerned, it’s not like Allison has ever rubbed him the wrong way (outside of the petty sort where she was his best friend’s girlfriend and she was stealing Stiles’ time with him), not like she’d apparently done by being related to the Argents for Derek and company, but Isaac looked frantic and scared. Stiles isn’t sure he’d seen Isaac looking like that since he was turned, and that was enough to make him uneasy. 

Derek reacted immediately, throwing his cards down on the table and flying out the door. Peter shrugged at Stiles as Derek’s thundering footsteps echoed up the stairwell, but made no move to follow. Okay then. Well Stiles was too curious not to see what was going on, so he stood up and followed after Derek, not bothering to tell Peter not to cheat. He didn’t think they were going to get back to their game.

Stiles froze when he rounded the corner to the stairs. Allison was indeed at the door, but it didn’t look like any version of Allison Stiles had seen before. She was so so pale and he’d be willing to say she was sick, but her eyes were glossy white, like she’d gotten herself plastered and then rolled her eyes into the back of her head. She didn’t look _human_.

“Allison?” he said, and she perked right up from the doorway, grinning at him. Her teeth at least looked normal, he guessed, so she wasn’t some freaky demon imposter or something. 

“Stiles! Just the boy I was meaning to talk to. I was just telling Derek here—“

“Mom!” Derek said, interrupting her, and _what?_ Mom? Allison was the only person in the room outside of he and Derek, let alone the only other girl. 

Allison shoved her hand against Derek’s chest and he moved back easily, but reached up to hold her wrist and keep her hand there. She rolled her eyes and sighed exasperatedly. 

“Sweetie, don’t interrupt,” Allison said, and then turned back towards Stiles. “I need to tell you this and I don’t know how long I have in this body.” 

Was Allison his mom? That didn’t make any sense. Stiles’ head was spinning and he had no fucking clue what was going on.

“No, Mom, you need to get out of her right now. She’s going to die.” 

“Well who am I supposed to be in, then? I need to talk to you both and she’s the only person in this room I can possess outside of Stiles.” 

“Peter’s upstairs with Isaac,” someone said, and it wasn’t until Derek and Allison—no, Derek’s _Mom_ —turned to face Stiles that he realized he was the one who said it. 

She smiled gently at him, but Stiles wasn’t at ease. Her hand was still trapped against Derek’s chest, and Stiles realized that Derek’s hand was positioned so funny because he was keeping track of Allison’s pulse. “I can’t possess werewolves. I tried with Scott, you see.”

“Mom, she’s fading! Just get back in Stiles right now.”

“What?” Stiles shouted, and Allison opened her mouth to argue with Derek. He shoved her forward and told her to get back in Stiles, in _him_ , again. 

“Fine,” Allison grit out, and then ripped her hand away from Derek. “I’m sorry Stiles, you weren’t meant to die,” she said, and Allison’s eyes rolled forward and Stiles fell back into the stairs before everything went dark.

* * *

He came to with Derek’s concerned face looking down at him, but Stiles couldn’t bring himself to care about easing it. He was laying across a couch in the living room, probably the one he slept on those earlier nights, and the little sky he could see through one of the windows was dark. It’d been late afternoon last thing he knew. 

So Derek’s mom was some sort of _ghost_ or whatever, possessing people, possessing _Stiles_ , and that somehow killed him. Derek’s comments about doing anything to see his family again pissed him off. Apparently he’d be willing to kill an innocent bystander in order to see his mom and that’s just…it’s fucking disgusting. He didn’t give two shits if the Alpha Pack got him. 

“How long have you known?” Stiles asked, his voice tinny and strange to his own ears. How could he know Derek’s mom wasn’t listening in too? 

Derek looked uncomfortable. Stiles didn’t care. “I…what?”

“Jesus, Derek, it’s not a hard question. How. Long. Have. You. Known?”

Derek looked away and brought a hand up to scratch the back of his neck. A sheepish movement. Stiles glared at him until he answered. 

“Since that first night you slept in my bed,” he said quietly. Stiles almost missed it; it sounded more like an exhale than an answer.

“Since the… _God_ , Derek, and you didn’t think you should bring this up?”

Stiles pulled himself up to a sitting position, feeling both angrier and stiffer than he had in a long time, probably before he died really. Derek took a step back and hunched his shoulders in. 

“I just—“ Derek trailed off and stared at his shoes.

“What? Thought it didn’t apply to me? ‘Cause it’s not like she _killed_ me or anything. No, I’m just a spectator in this whole fucking thing.” 

Derek’s eyes snapped up and honed on Stiles, but Stiles didn’t turn away. “I wanted to tell you but—“

“But _nothing_ , Derek. You should’ve told me.” 

The little confidence Derek had gained with his anger dissipated. “Yeah, yeah I should’ve,” he said, and when Stiles didn’t reply he sort of collapsed into one of the chairs. 

Did he even care about Stiles like he said? Miss _him_ when he was stuck in Alpha Pack land? Or was it all concern for his mom since Stiles was some sort of fucking vessel. 

“Just tell me one thing,” Stiles began, and he waited until Derek’s eyes were on him before he continued. “Did you choose me specifically when you decided to resurrect your family, or whatever?” 

Derek’s face morphed into a number of feelings, notably confusion, before settling on anger. And good, that’s what Stiles felt like too. His fingers dug into the arms of the couch, but he didn’t stand. “You think _I_ did that?”

“You’re telling me you didn’t? Excuse me for not believing that when you _knew your mother was inside me_ and didn’t tell me. “ 

“Well I didn’t, Stiles. I have no idea how they got back or why you were ‘chosen’ or whatever.”

“ _They_?” 

Derek’s face dropped, and Stiles’ eyes narrowed. There was something else he was hiding from Stiles? 

“Yeah-“ Derek huffed “-you know how you woke up in the morgue?” 

Stiles raised an eyebrow in lieu of an affirmative, and Derek shifted under his gaze. 

“You weren’t the first to do that,” Derek finished, and Stiles waited a minute or so to see if Derek would continue. He didn’t. 

“Do you mean Jackson? ‘Cause I know…” Stiles trailed off when Derek started shaking his head no. 

“No, not Jackson. A little boy.” 

Stiles pinched the part of his nose between his eyes and furrowed his brows. A little boy? If he remembered right, there hadn’t been any reports of anyone being murdered since Jackson was “killed” but there’d been disappearances. Erica and Boyd, for one, but there had been one more, but the parents thought the kid’s biological parents had stolen him.

“Two months ago. The ten-year-old with the red bike.”

Derek’s gaze drifted somewhere to Stiles’ left, and that was all the answer Stiles needed. 

“Yeah. My, uh, dad that time. But he tried to get rid of Isaac saying something about him not being a part of our pack so we kept him in one of the shifting rooms for the young kids who aren’t able to control themselves yet, but how was I supposed to know he was my dad? I thought he was delusional and I didn’t…not until you came and it was _Mom_. But dad died by that point. We gave him food and stuff but I guess he needed to eat dirt too and we just. I don’t know what’s going on any more than you do, Stiles.” 

“And you didn’t report that you found the kid?”

Derek grimaced, but didn’t turn to look at Stiles. “I’ve been convicted once, Stiles, I can’t. It’s just. No, I didn’t.”

He looked so pathetic curled up in the chair like he was, his arms rigid across his thighs and his fingers dug sharply into his knees. Derek was a fucking mess, that was for sure. Stiles felt the anger drain out of him, leaving him mostly empty and tired. Who knew how the Hales kept out of trouble before because if Stiles knew one thing it was that werewolves didn’t know how to keep from stepping in cow shit.

“Is there anything else?” Stiles asked, and Derek finally met his eyes. 

“Yeah, stuff Mom said, but I can’t do that until Isaac and Peter get back.”

“And where are they?”

“Out.”

Great.


End file.
